


Hands of Clay: Outtakes

by Mhalachai



Series: Hands of Clay [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Domestic, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Gen, Kid Fic, Outtakes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-01
Updated: 2017-11-27
Packaged: 2018-02-24 15:09:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 57,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2585939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mhalachai/pseuds/Mhalachai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Outtakes/scenes from <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/2143266/chapters/4682211"><strong>Hands of Clay</strong></a>, a domestic/kid!AU in which James Barnes, adoptive father to five-year-old Natasha Romanoff, meets up again with his childhood best friend Steve Rogers and Steve's five-year-old son Clint.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The One With Mother's Day at the Zoo

**Author's Note:**

> Each chapter of these outtakes is a stand-alone. The zoo chapter takes place between chapters 5 and 6 of Hands of Clay.

* * *

On Mother’s Day, Steve and James  picked that Sunday  to go to the zoo because why not, it wasn’t raining and maybe they’d go for ice cream afterwards ( _Geeze, Steve, why not just take them to Disneyland while you’re at it) (because I have a meeting tomorrow, but there’s always Father’s Day for that) (oh god shut up before they hear you)._

So they went to the zoo, and Natasha simply loved the red pandas and Clint wanted to spend the rest of his life feeding the alpacas and sheep in the barnyard, and James very nearly tricked Steve into milking one of the cows. After a couple of hours, however, even Clint started sagging and Steve made the executive decision that it was  ice cream time, only first they had  to do the bathroom thing.

Clint went with Steve into the men’s room, while Natasha got a pep talk and directions to not dawdle, then she headed into the women’s washroom while James waited outside for her in as non-creeperish a way as he could.

( _Daddy, I am five years old. I am a big girl!_ She had said indignantly the week before at the library. _I can go to the bathroom by myself_. And so James had let her, hovering nervously by the drinking fountain until Natasha came back out again, triumphant and smug about how very capable and adult she was and then James ended up carrying her home because it was raining and she didn’t want her shoes to get wet.)

Steve and Clint reappeared, then Natasha came out ( _yes I washed my hands. Yes, I used soap. Daddy, honestly!)_ Then it was James’ turn, and so he didn’t get to witness what Steve later would call "the teachable moment from hell."

So yeah it was Mother’s Day and Natasha didn’t care, she didn’t have a mother and all the grown-ups who said she should give her father something instead were wrong, because Father’s Day was in June and her Daddy would get his present then because he was her daddy and Natasha was doing just fine without a mother, thank you very much. But Clint had a mommy and even though he only got to see her a few times a year, he loved his mommy very much and thought she was perfect and beautiful and smart and gave the best hugs and sometimes he missed her so much that he cried himself to sleep, but he didn’t tell his dad because it made his dad sad and Clint didn’t want to see his dad sad.

(He also had a secret about Mother’s Day, one he hadn’t told even Natasha. He had made his mother a Mother’s Day card in kindergarten last week like everyone else. He had been so careful in gluing the macaroni shapes onto the construction paper, and had made _two_ special purple flowers instead of one like he was supposed to. He smuggled the card home in his backpack and hid it in his secret box of things he was going to show mommy when she came home again, like the special flat stone he’d found at Coney Island and the drawing he’d made at Christmas of him and her and daddy. One day, mommy would come home and he would give her the Mother’s Day card and she would be happy and maybe she wouldn’t leave quite so soon this time.)

In any event, back at the zoo, Steve was sitting on a bench checking his email while Clint and Natasha debated the merits of asking for a snack before they left, versus waiting for the promised ice cream, when some lady butted in and asked them if they had done nice things for their mommies on Mother’s Day.

Natasha looked at the woman with narrowed eyes, but Clint answered right away because that was what he did when someone asked him a question. “My mommy works. I live with my dad.”

The woman bent down in front of Clint, which made Natasha very unhappy because her daddy had always told her that strange adults shouldn’t talk to children without checking with the other grownups first. And Steve was sitting _right over there_. “Oh, you poor thing,” the woman was saying, her face all screwed up. “Your daddy not even letting you see your mommy on Mother’s Day.”

That wasn’t right, not at all, but Clint didn’t know what to say because a big ball of sad was starting to balloon in his stomach, the kind of sad where he missed his mommy so much and he couldn’t talk about it to anyone. “My mommy’s working,” he tried to shout, but it came out as a whisper and there were hot tears in his eyes and his throat hurt and he desperately wanted this woman to go away.

Natasha, her hands clenched at her sides, shoved her way between Clint and the strange woman, and said very loudly, “Well, _I_ don’t have a mommy. She didn’t want me and so she left me in a garbage can and now I have a daddy and _he_ ,” Natasha said, stepping closer to the woman. “Told me not to talk to strangers.”

Steve was there then, asking what was the matter and Clint could press his face against his father’s pant leg and Natasha was saying things but all Clint wanted was for everyone to go away so he could hide and cry alone because only babies cried because they missed their mothers, everyone knew that.

Then Steve was lifting Clint up to his shoulder and asking him what was the matter and the great big balloon of sad rose up in Clint’s stomach and came out his mouth and he started to cry because he missed mommy and he hadn’t seen her for so long and he was worried that she was never going to come home and she would _die_ because Clint was five and when Daddy was five his mother died and Daddy had to go into foster care because there was no one to take care of him and he was _all alone_.

This was the scene that James came upon when he exited the bathroom, a scant minute later.

James looked at the situation, realized that his fatherly experience was of no use, and mentally put on his sergeant’s bars once again. He dispatched a still-indignant Natasha to the vending machine to buy a soda, gave Steve a firm pat on the shoulder, and darted into the men’s’ room to grab a handful of paper towels.

By this point, Clint was so worked up that he couldn’t stop crying, so James just twisted the lid off the soda bottle, shoved it in Clint’s face, and said, “Drink.”

Still crying, Clint took the bottle and drank. His sobs tapered off slowly as he knocked back half the soda in one go.

When the sobs were gone, James took the bottle away from him, handed him the handful of napkins, and said, “Blow.”

Clint blew his nose, then hiccupping softly, pressed his face against his father’s neck and let Steve pat his back for a while.

“What the hell happened?”

Natasha launched directly into the tale, her wrath and desire for vengeance apparent against the person who had made Clint cry. Steve just sat there, holding Clint with one arm and taking a shot of soda to fortify himself before handing the bottle back to James.

As Natasha’s story ended, James pressed his fingers against the bridge of his nose. “Okay, and this is a side note, Natasha, but no one left you in a garbage can. You were left at the hospital.”

“I know,” Natasha said, her hands clasped behind her back. “But when I say that, people get weird and they go away. I wanted her to go away.”

As James rolled his eyes, Steve ran his hand over Clint’s head. “What’s up, buddy?” he asked.

With a mighty sniffle, Clint said reluctantly, “I miss mommy.”

“Oh, Clint.” Steve shifted Clint around so they were looking at each other. “You know that your mother is working, far away, right? That’s why she isn’t here.”

“I know,” Clint said, and wiped his nose on his sleeve. “But sometimes I miss her.”

“If you miss your mommy, you should write her a letter like you write me a letter,” Natasha put in, taking the soda bottle from James. “Also you should eat ice cream.”

Clint sniffled again and looked at his father with huge, wet eyes. “Can we still have ice cream?” he asked.

”Of course,” Steve said, and if the hug he gave Clint was just a little too tight, Clint didn’t complain. “And any time you want to talk about your mom, just ask, okay?”

“Really?” Clint asked.

“Really.” Steve kissed Clint on the top of the head and stood up with him. “Come on, let’s go wash your face then go get ice cream, okay?”

James and Natasha watched the Rogers boys head into the bathroom. Then they looked at each other. “I don’t like it when Clint is sad,” Natasha said crossly.

“Me either,” James said. “Nat, did I ever tell you the most important part of being a best friend?”

Natasha clutched at James’ sleeve, her eyes wide. “What is it?” she asked breathlessly.

“You stick up for your friend,” James said grimly. “Any time they’re in trouble, you’re right at their side. You’re with them to the end of the line, just like they’ll be there with you.”

Natasha listened to this advice  as if it was a sermon. “I will, Daddy,” she said solemnly. “I got Clint’s back, every time!”

“Good.” James looked around to make sure Steve was still in the bathroom. “Now give me a high-five. You did good today, pumpkin.”

Natasha gave high-five, low-five, and the ever-important fist bump. If anyone ever tried to make her Clint sad again, they would have to go through her first.

(And then they went to get ice cream and in his guilt over Sharon, Steve let Clint get a triple scoop sundae and watched in horrified fascination as Clint finished the whole thing.)

(and that night then they had a long talk about missing mommy and there were some tears and lots of hugs and Clint showed Steve the Mother’s Day card and Steve was impressed, and that night Clint didn’t cry at all.)


	2. The One Where Clint and Natasha Go to the Museum

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Picture, if you will: Five-year-old Clint with his raggedy blond hair and his favorite blue t-shirt and his soccer shorts and his dirty sneakers (and purple socks) about to get into trouble as only an AU version of Clint Barton could.

* * *

Today, Clint knew, was going to be the _best_ day, because today was the day that he and Natasha (his _best friend_ Natasha!) were going to go to the museum!

Clint knew a lot about museums. His dad had taken him to a whole bunch of museums, but today they were going to go to his favorite: The Dinosaur museum!

Clint liked the dinosaurs and the butterflies and the birds (he _loved_ the birds!). Dad always made him go through the rooms with the rocks and that was _so boring_ but Clint went because his daddy liked it. Clint also liked to look at the stuff people made all over the world, because then Clint got to think about what he would do when he was a grown-up boy and had money like Uncle Tony and could go places and shoot his bow and arrow anywhere he wanted!

But Natasha had never been to this museum, so Clint felt very grown up and superior as they walked up the steps, Skye holding each of them by the hand.

"All right, kiddos," Skye said. "Who wants to pay?"

They both did, so Skye handed them each a money and held them up to the counter to pay. The lady behind the counter had a funny face, but Clint didn't care, he was having so much fun already! Daddy never let him pay with money. With Daddy, Clint only ever got to swipe the subway card.

Skye, Clint decided, was pretty neat for an old person.

Once they were inside, Skye pulled him and Natasha over to the side of the hallway. "Okay, here's the plan," Skye said as she knelt down. "There's a lot of stuff in here, too much stuff to see in one day, so you each get to pick two things to look at, then we'll have lunch and then see how things are."

"Can I have cheese?" Natasha asked, rubbing her tummy.

"If they have cheese, then yes."

"Can I have hot dog?" Clint asked hopefully. "Daddy lets me have a hot dog. Can I have a hot dog _now_?"

"You two munchkins had a snack before we left the house," Skye pointed out. "We can eat later. Now," she went on, standing. "Who needs to pee?"

It had been a long subway ride from Natasha's house in Brooklyn to the museum, so Clint went to the boys' room and Natasha went to the girls' room while Skye waited outside. Then Skye waited some more because Clint forgot to wash his hands and so he had to back into the bathroom. It was stupid washing his hands when he was out, Clint always thought, because the taps were so far away and he was too short. He'd much rather wash his hands when he got home.

Finally, they went into the hall and up the elevator to the top floor.

Natasha was super excited to see the dinosaurs, and Clint was too. He liked it when Natasha was excited! He was glad to have a friend like Natasha, who liked all the cool things like dinosaurs and bears and birds and merry-go-rounds and ice cream. In fact, Clint was so happy to be Natasha's friend that he hugged her right then and there in front of the Tyrannosaurus Rex.

Natasha giggled and hugged him back as Skye took a picture of them on her phone. "How about I send this to your dads?" Skye said.

"Okay, but send a silly one too!" Natasha exclaimed. She stuck out her tongue and Clint made a face and Skye laughed and took another picture.

That completed, they looked at all the big dinosaur skeletons. Clint liked looking at skeletons, because everyone had a skeleton inside of them. Clint had bones in his arms and legs and in his head and that was pretty neat! One of Clint's favorite things to do in the summer was to go to Grandpa Abraham's house, because Grandpa Abraham had been a doctor before he got so old, and he had old x-rays that Clint could look at, all types of bones inside people. Grandpa Abraham even had an x-ray of Clint's very own Daddy, when Daddy was growing up and he fell off the roof when he was trying to sneak out and he broke his arm and Clint could see the little tiny cracks in Daddy's bones.

(Daddy called that a 'cautionary tale' but Clint didn't care because he would _never_ fall down when he didn't mean to. He could jump off things so good and he never got hurt!)

Then it was Natasha's turn to pick something and she wanted to look at the elephants so they went to see the elephants. Then it was Clint's turn again, and Skye took them into the place with all the birds. Clint looked at all the birds, and he even put on his glasses so he could look at them close up. But he didn't look at them close up for long, because he could see just as well from far away.

Before Clint got tired of looking at birds, Skye said it was Natasha's turn, and Natasha wanted to go look at the pretty stones.

Clint groaned and dragged his heels, but he went with them. Halfway down the hall, Natasha put her hands on her hips and glared at Clint. "I did what you wanted, now you gotta do what I want!" she exclaimed. "Stop being mean!"

"I'm not being mean!" Clint declared hotly. "Rocks are dumb, that's all."

Natasha gasped, shocked. "I didn't say _birds_ are dumb!"

"You like birds!"

"I know!" Natasha shook her head, her hair flying. "I want to go look at pretty rocks and you can't stop me!"

"Guys, hold on," Skye ordered. "Clint, we're going to look at the hall of gems for Nat, then we're going to go for lunch. Okay?"

Cling let out his breath in a huff, his shoulders dropping. "Okay," he said sadly. Rocks were _so boring_.

Natasha held her head high as she marched along in front of Clint, and Skye came up behind them with her hand on Clint's shoulder as they navigated through the crowds. The museum was getting noisy now, with all kinds of people talking loud. Clint wrinkled his nose at the noise; his hearing aid always made loud voices sound mixed up and unhappy. He wished he could take his hearing aid out and just let Natasha talk into his left ear but his dad made him promise that Clint would never take his hearing aid out except when it was bedtime or bath time.

Natasha was captivated by the gemstones, going up on her toes and saying _ooh_ and _ahh_. She asked Skye to read the words on the display and Clint, so bored he thought he might fall over, wandered away just a few feet. He could still see Skye and Natasha, so it wasn't as if Clint was running away.

He stood by the wall and looked at the big rocks and was so bored. Clint thought about putting on his glasses, but it was so much easier to see far away that he didn't bother. He looked at the rocks, then he looked at the people in the crowd. There were so many people. But even that was boring.

Then a flash of blonde hair caught Clint's attention and pulled him away from the wall, his breath stuck in his throat.

He'd seen her!

He'd seen _Mommy_!

"Mommy!" Clint shouted, but the woman moved deeper into the crowd. She must not have heard him!

Desperation chattered in his head as he looked back around where Skye was holding Natasha up to one of the glass cases. He wasn't supposed to run away from Skye, but his mother was _leaving_!

Looking back where he'd last seen Mommy, Clint clenched his hands into fists. He had no choice. He knew it was bad, but he had seen Mommy, and he had to find her. He had to!

Putting his head down, Clint ran into the crowd. He almost lost her a few times, but he kept his mommy in the edge of his vision, her blonde hair and her dark blue skirt. Up the stairs Clint ran, along the corridors, and then, finally, he saw her disappear through a door far back in one of the exhibits, a door with writing on it.

Well, Clint couldn't read the writing but he knew that he had to get to his mommy!

Breathing hard, Clint waited until there was a big crowd of people coming before he ran to the door. Clint knew that a lot of people meant a lot of noise, and noise usually kept the grown-ups from noticing things you were doing.

The door was heavy under his hands but he pushed it open just far enough to slip inside.

The hallway on the other side of the door was long, brightly lit, and silent. Clint could hear his heartbeat heavy in his ears as he walked down the hall. There was no other noise, no one there.

Where had his mommy gone?

Clint kept walking. Maybe she went through a door and he would find her if he just kept on looking.

Eventually, the hallway came to a fork, and Clint didn't know what to do. Should he turn left or right? Which way would his mother have gone?

Suddenly, a noise behind him! Clint jumped and ran to the right and turned into the first doorway he found. The doorknob turned with a creak and Clint ducked inside, pushing the door closed behind him.

The noise was still coming closer, and it sounded like a monster! Clint had to hide quick! Even through the room was dark and dusty, Clint could see enough from the faint light shining under the door to see there was a desk, and so he ran over and hid in the space under the desk. And just in time, because the door flew open!

"Anything?" asked a gruff voice.

"No," said another gruff voice, and the door closed again and Clint was alone in the dark.

He curled up in a ball, putting his arms around his legs and resting his cheek on his knee. He felt terrible, just _terrible_. He hadn't been able to find his mommy, and now that he was sitting still, he realized that he had done a very bad thing indeed in running off without telling Skye or Natasha. His dad was going to be _so mad_ at him.

And he hadn't been able to find his mom. He knew he had seen her, even though it was just a glimpse! Clint looked at Mommy's picture every morning and every night before he went to bed, and in that brief instant in the crowded gallery, he _knew_ he had seen his mother's face.

The terrible feeling in his stomach sank down low to the ground. Clint was almost six years old, and he knew he had done a bad thing when he ran away without telling Skye. Daddy and James had said that the most important thing to remember was that Clint had to tell Skye where he was going. And now, he didn't even know where he was.

Clint sniffled, and wiped his nose on his shirt.

Suddenly, the door opened and the lights went on!

Clint pressed himself against the underside of the desk, in case it was monsters! But Clint didn't hear any monsters, and after a minute he peeked out from under the desk.

There was someone by the wall, a lady with long brown hair in a braid. She was putting on a long white coat, then she went and sat down at a desk on the other side of the room. She didn't seem like a monster, so Clint crawled out from under the desk and stood up. The lady didn't see him, as she had her back to him, so Clint squared his shoulders and said, "Hello."

The lady let out a little "meep!" and spun around, her hands clutching her chest. She stared at Clint. Clint stared at her.

Finally, Clint said, "I got lost looking for my mommy. Can you help me find Skye?"

The next few minutes were very loud. The lady called security and the gruff voices came back, and they led Clint down the hallways and stairs and they were big and mean and Clint was almost ready to kick them in the ankles like Uncle Tony taught him, when they came out into an office and Skye and Natasha were there.

"Oh thank god," Skye said, collapsing to her knees as Clint ran over to her. "Are you okay?"

"Uh huh," Clint said, hugging Skye. He knew that you weren't supposed to hug a teacher but Skye wasn't really a teacher, she was Skye, so he figured he wouldn't get punished too bad for hugging her. "I got lost!"

"Did you have an adventure?" demanded Natasha, as she squished in against Skye for a hug as well. "We couldn't find you!"

"I saw my mommy!" Clint explained, pulling back from Skye. "And I went to go find her but she ran away!"

Skye's face was fuzzy, so Clint put on his glasses where they hung from his neck by the cord. Now he could see that Skye looked sad and unhappy. "You saw your mother?" she asked.

"You did?" Natasha squealed. "Where did she go?"

"I don't know!" Clint waved his hands to indicate how little he knew. "I tried to follow her but she got away."

Skye's face squeezed up. "Clint, you dad told me that your mother is in London," she said, and her voice sounded weird. "You didn't see her today."

"Yes, I did!" Clint insisted. "At least, it looked like my mommy."

Skye reached for him again and gave him another hug. "I am so glad you're okay," she whispered in his ear.

"I'm sorry I ran away," Clint said against Skye's neck. "I forgot to come get you."

Skye squeezed him extra tight, then let him go. "Now, I need to talk to security, so you stay here with Natasha," Skye said, then stood and went over to the mean grown-ups.

Now it was Natasha's turn to hug Clint. "I was worried," Natasha said when she pulled back. "Daddy says there are monsters out there in daylight and they come take little children."

"I didn't see any monsters," Clint said, scratching his nose. "But I did see my mom."

Natasha took Clint's hands in hers. "I believe you," she said solemnly. "You're my best friend and best friends believe their best friends."

"Good." Clint squeezed Natasha's hands. "When I wake up, I remember that I am best friends with you and that makes me happy."

Natasha grinned at him. "I want lunch," she declared. "Let's tell Skye we need lunch." Still holding hands, Clint and Natasha walked over to Skye.

* * *

After lunch, during which Skye didn't move more than three feet from Clint, they got on the subway to go home. Skye held Natasha by one hand and Clint by the other the whole way back to Natasha's house. From the subway station, they walked home, then Skye let them inside the house, locked the door behind her, and collapsed on the sofa.

Natasha and Clint stood looking at her, uncertain as to what they should do next, when James came out of his office. "You guys are back early," he said. He wasn't wearing his metal arm under his t-shirt. Clint wished that he could take out his hearing aid sometimes, just like sometimes James didn't wear his arm. "How was the museum?"

Skye sat up, but as she did so Clint let go of Natasha's hand and went to stand in front of James. "I ran away from Skye and got lost," Clint said. "But then I got found."

James stared. "What?"

"He saw his mommy!" Natasha burst out. "And so he went to find her but he forgot to tell me and Skye first."

"Security found him in a behind-the-scenes area," Skye said, pushing her hair out of her eyes. "He'd snuck past two layers of security to get where he was, they have no idea how he did it."

"I just went to look for Mommy," Clint explained as James sat down heavily in the big armchair. "She was going away and I wanted to find her!"

James put his hand over his mouth for a long moment. Then he said, "Come here," in a quiet voice, and held out his hand.

Clint went over and so did Natasha, and they both climbed up into the space beside James on the chair. It was a squish and Natasha's elbow was pressing against Clint's ribs but that was okay.

"You know, sometimes, when we miss someone very much," said James, "We think we see them in places they aren't."

"She was there," Clint said, putting his arms around Natasha's neck. "I saw her."

"You might have thought you saw her, but it was just a trick of your imagination," James said. "Your dad told me two days ago that your mother is back in London. That's on the other side of the world."

"I saw her at the museum," Clint said, and he was getting angry. Why didn't grown-ups _listen_?

James cleared his throat. "Clint," he said, "I'm an old man."

"Daddy is thirty-two," Natasha contributed.

"And I'm so old that I know that I don't know a lot of stuff. But I do know two things." James reached out to ruffle Clint's hair. "I know how much you love your mom."

"I do."

"And I know that you need to stop running away." James looked at Clint and Natasha and he had a serious grown-up face. "Me and Skye, we look after you when your dad's at work, but when he leaves you here it's because he knows you'll be safe. You can't run away from Skye any more."

"But what if Mommy comes?" Clint demanded, un-hugging Natasha and sitting up straight. "What if she comes and I can't find you?"

James put his hand on Clint's shoulder. "Clint, if your mom comes looking for you, then she will understand that you need to tell me and Skye first before going anywhere. I promise."

Clint considered this. "Is that a grown-up thing?"

"It is," James said. "All grown-ups know that kids have to tell someone where they're going. It's a rule. You sign the paperwork when you're twenty-one. Okay?"

Clint looked at his knee. "Okay," he said in a small voice.

James squeezed his shoulder and Natasha leaned in to kiss Clint on the cheek. "Thanks," James said. "This is important."

Skye said something and James turned his head and Natasha scrambled down from the chair, but Clint stayed where he was. He may not have known a lot of things in his life, but he knew what his mother looked like, and he knew _one hundred percent_ that he had seen her in the museum.

And if his dad thought that Mommy was in some place called London, then Clint's dad was _wrong_.


	3. The One Where Bucky Parents Through a Tantrum

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes place after Chapter 10 of [Hands of Clay](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2143266/chapters/5683961).

* * *

It was the Sunday before the last week of school, and Steve and Bucky took the kids to the mall because they all needed summer clothes and Natasha wanted some colouring paper and Steve had promised Clint a gift to reward him for his interview at the new school going so well. And Bucky had said they could all have ice cream afterwards if they were leaving for home by five.

So they got Natasha's paper, but Clint didn't see anything he wanted. Girding himself, Steve led the way to the children's clothing section and prepared himself for a scene.

But Clint was too busy playing with Natasha to throw a fit over trying on new clothes, and Steve held his breath as he got Clint new shorts and bigger t-shirts and even a pair of dress slacks would last (hopefully) until Christmas.

Then Clint had to decide on which superhero underpants he wanted, and Bucky took the opportunity to get Natasha to try on new clothing. "Shopping is better with Maria, Daddy," Natasha said in all seriousness as she held up her arms to try on a new sundress over her clothes.

"Maria is better at this," Bucky agreed mildly. "Now, do you want a skirt or shorts?"

Natasha wanted a skirt, and was deciding between purple or green when Bucky picked up a pair of little girl's jean shorts and held them up, making a face. "What?" Steve said, stepping away from Clint to speak to Bucky.

"Who the hell decided that five-year-olds should dress like this?" Bucky muttered. "These aren't shorts, this is a belt."

"Does Nat want stuff like that?"

"If Natasha had her way, she'd wear her princess dress every day she's not in school." Bucky put the shorts back. "You're going to lose Clint, by the way."

Steve whipped around and was just in time to catch his son, who was making a dash for the escalator, Superman underpants clutched in his grubby hands. Not bothering with any explanation, Steve just tossed Clint over his shoulder and walked back over to the Barnes.

Bucky was listening to Natasha, nodding while Natasha extrapolated on her theme. Watching Bucky like this sent warm shivers down Steve's spine, at how wonderful Bucky was around the kids, how easy he was around Steve now, and just how amazing Bucky looked.

"Daddy, can I get down?" Clint asked plaintively. Giving his head a quick shake, Steve set his little boy on the ground.

"No more running off," Steve cautioned Clint. "We need to stick together, the four of us."

"Okay." Clint wandered over to the shopping cart and threw in the underpants. "Can we _go_?"

They made it through the checkout and back into the mall. Natasha and Clint were starting to droop; after all, there had been a lot of walking for little legs. But both children were clear that they were "all right" and so on they went.

Things were going just fine until all of a sudden, Clint let loose an unearthly shriek and bolted through the crowd. Steve ran after his child, trusting Bucky would be able to handle Natasha on his own.

Steve caught up with Clint inside of a gift store. "Clint, for the last time, stop taking off on me!"

"But Daddy, I saw him!" Clint grabbed Steve's hand and pulled him deeper into the store. "It's there, up there!"

Steve looked where Clint indicated, up on a high shelf of stuffed toys.

"The blue one!" There was indeed a hint of blue fluff behind a row of white plush horses. Frowning, Steve looked back out into the mall, then at the shelf. How had Clint even _seen_ that from that distance?

"Daddy, you said I could have a present, can I have that one? Please? Please?" Clint was now jumping up and down, hanging off Steve's arm. " _Please?_ "

With his free arm, Steve reached up to retrieve the blue toy from the shelf. He recognized the creature; it was from one of the old cartoons he grew up with, Frederick the Blue Dog. He wouldn't have thought that Clint would have seen the show, let alone be able to spot the toy from so far away.

"Do you know who this is?"

"It's Frederick!" Clint exclaimed. "He's blue, and he has a friend named Sally the Snail, and they go on adventures and are friends!"

Steve knelt down, handing the toy to Clint, who hugged the stuffed dog to his chest in rapturous joy. "How did you know that?"

"I saw them on the net-fix," Clint said, mangling the word.

Steve, who did not have Netflix, asked, "When?"

"When I stayed over at Natasha's house and we woke up and you went back to sleep and we tried to watch the ponies but that was boring so we watched Frederick instead!" Clint said in a rush. He hugged the dog tighter. "Can I have him?"

Steve reached out, to ruffle Clint's hair with one hand and to surreptitiously check the toy's price tag with the other. To his relief, the toy had been marked down to twelve dollars. "Sure thing, sport," Steve said. "Let's go buy him."

Clint was all smiles, bouncing up and down on the way to the checkout. The lady behind the counter made doe eyes at Steve as Steve unfolded a few bills from his wallet, then physically lifted his son to the counter so the woman could scan the tag on the toy in Clint's arms.

"What's up?" came Bucky's voice from behind them. Steve glanced over his shoulder to see Bucky leading Natasha by his metal hand, the shopping bags dangling from his normal hand.

"I promised Clint a present, and this is the one he wants."

"This is Frederick!" Clint told Bucky as Steve set him back on the ground.

"Yeah, I remember." Bucky raised his eyebrows at Steve. "That show still on TV?"

"Clint said he and Natasha saw it on Netflix."

Bucky's face cleared. "Yeah, I set her up with a kid account," Bucky said as the cashier handed Steve back his change. "Normally, we watch TV together, but when I need to get stuff done…"

"Hey," said Natasha suddenly. "That's Frederick."

Steve was surprised to see Clint pull away from Natasha, holding the toy out of her reach. "He's mine," Clint said. "Daddy bought him for me."

Before Steve could tell Clint that he needed to share, Natasha was turning to her father. "Daddy, buy me one too," she ordered.

"That was the last one in stock," interjected the cashier. "We've been trying to sell those for ages."

Natasha frowned, the corners of her mouth turning down. "Then I want that one," she said.

"No!" Clint said. "He's mine, I not give him to you."

Natasha lunged forward, trying to grab the toy from Clint, but Clint darted behind Steve's legs. Bucky reacted quicker than Steve would have thought, dropping the bags and grabbing Natasha around the middle. "Natasha, stop," Bucky said in a sharp voice. "This is not how we behave with our friends."

"But I want it!" Natasha said, stamping her foot.

"You're being mean!" Clint exclaimed, but he stayed out of her reach.

"Outside," Bucky said, taking Natasha's hand and pulling her out of the shop. Steve picked up Bucky's bags and gave the cashier an apologetic smile as he herded Clint out into the mall.

It wasn't difficult to find Bucky and Natasha. Bucky had penned Natasha in against a bench, and Natasha was descending into a full-scale meltdown, stamping her feet and crying. Bucky just knelt in front of his daughter and spoke to her quietly, calm in the face of the storm.

Putting his hand on Clint's shoulder, Steve guided his son over to the Barnes. Clint dragged his feet, but he went and sat next to Steve on the bench, as far away from Natasha as he could get.

"…I hate you!" Natasha was telling her father accusingly, in between gulped sobs.

"No, you don't," Bucky said evenly.

"Yes I do!" Natasha said. She rubbed at her face angrily. "You never let me have any fun!"

Bucky took a breath and let it out through his nose. "I do let you have fun," he said. "But I will not let you behave like that towards your friend. And you don't hate me."

"How'd you know?" Natasha let the last word trail up into a sad whine.

"Because you're angry at my actions," Bucky said. "Like I'm not happy with the way you're acting right now. But I love you. I always love you."

Steve looked at Bucky. He'd never heard anyone say it quite like that, but Bucky's simple statement hit Steve right in the gut.

His words apparently had made an impact on Natasha as well. She sniffled and blinked, but the frustrated anger in her motions bled away. "I love you, Daddy, but I don't like you right now."

"That's okay." Bucky eased back so he was sitting on the ground, as if he took a seat on the floor of urban malls every day of the week. "Do you understand why I'm not happy with your behaviour?"

"No!"

"It was because you were rude to Clint."

"He has to share! He's my friend!"

"He does _not_ have to share," Bucky said. "You asked him to give you his brand new toy, and he said no, and you ignored that."

"But you make _me_ share!"

"I ask you to share your things because it's the polite thing to do," Bucky said. "But Clint said no. What does it mean when someone says no?"

Natasha stamped her foot again. "It means they said no," she wailed. "But Daddy, I _want the toy_."

"Sometimes we don't get what we want," Bucky said reasonably. "And most importantly, we do not get what we want if it makes our friends sad."

Natasha's lower lip trembled. "I don't want Clint to be sad!" she burst out.

At Steve's side, Clint leaned against his father, his head a soft pressure against Steve's ribs.

"That's the important part of being friends," Bucky said as he held out his hand to Natasha. "We don't just think about what _we_ want, we think about what _they_ want. If you don't want Clint to be sad, you need to listen to him when he says no."

Natasha took Bucky hand and let herself be drawn against her father's shoulder. "Clint is my best friend!" she wailed into Bucky's neck. "I don't want him to be sad!"

"I know." Bucky patted Natasha on the back as he glanced over at Steve and Clint. "Having friends can be tough, but it's worth it."

Natasha dug her fingernails into Bucky's neck as he rocked her; Clint watched them for a while before he slid off the bench and walked tentatively over to Natasha. "I'm still your friend," Clint said.

Natasha sniffled as she looked up. "You're my best friend forever," she told him as she let go of her father's neck and pushed herself to her feet.

"Okay." Clint, however, did not move closer to Natasha. "Why'd you get mad at me?"

"I don't know!" Natasha said.

"Are you hungry?" Bucky asked as he brushed the hair back from Natasha's wet cheeks.

"No. I'm sad right here." Natasha pointed at her throat.

A look of comprehension passed over Bucky's face. "Nat, are you thirsty? Do you want some water?"

Natasha wiped her nose on her sleeve, considering. "Maybe."

"I have an idea," Bucky said. "Let's all go get something to drink."

"And then ice cream?" Clint said in a small voice.

Bucky smiled at the little boy. "Yes, and then ice cream. And then," he went on, moving to stand. Steve held out his hand automatically and Bucky took it, his palm warm in Steve's. "We are going home for some quiet time before dinner."

Clint frowned. "I don't want quiet time," he said sulkily. "I don't wanna nap."

"Then you don't have to nap." Bucky straightened up. Maybe it was Steve's imagination, but he held onto Steve's palm for longer than necessary. To cover the thrill down his spine at the thought, Steve slapped Bucky on the back as the man went to sit on the bench beside Steve. "Maybe I'll have a nap."

"Daddy, don't be silly," Natasha scolded. "You don't nap."

"Maybe I'm tired," Bucky said. "I'm a tired, tired old man." He reached out and caught Natasha's arm. "Sweet pea, can you apologize to Clint for ignoring him when he said no?"

Natasha turned against Bucky's knee, hiding her face in her hands for a moment. Then she looked over at Clint, her eyes wide and sad. "I'm sorry," she said in a small voice. "You said no and I didn't listen."

"And next time," Bucky chimed in. "If you want to do something and Clint says no, what are you going to do?"

Natasha scrunched up her nose in heavy concentration. "I will say 'okay' and go play by myself?"

Bucky gave an encouraging nod. "Yes. Because when someone says no, you listen to them. Just like you should expect someone to listen to you when you say no."

Clint was digesting this. "What if they said no then yes?"

"Then they've changed their minds." Bucky held out his metal hand, and Clint bounced over to lean against Bucky's other knee. "And that's okay. Like if you say you don't want any water now, but later you change your mind. You can do that, because that's what you want."

"But you gotta listen," Natasha interjected. " 'Cause if you don't listen, then you not know what they saying."

Clint transferred the stuffed toy to his left arm, using his right hand to push on his hearing aid. "Sometimes I can't listen good," he said.

Steve's breath caught in his throat. Clint so seldom mentioned his problems with hearing, but after the visit to the doctor the previous week, where the man had tested Clint's hearing and had indicated that there might be some slight downward change in Clint's right ear, the boy had been even more reluctant than ever to talk about it.

Now, Steve put his hand on Clint's back. "If you think you didn't hear someone, or didn't understand, you can ask them to repeat themselves," Steve said. "It's okay."

"Or you can ask me and I can tell you what they said," added Natasha.

"Okay." Clint shifted the stuffed animal onto Bucky's knees. "D'you wanna pet my dog?"

A brilliant smile appeared on Natasha's face. "Yes I do!" she exclaimed. Reaching out, she gently patted the dog's blue fuzzy head. "He's a nice doggy."

Clint was also smiling. "Okay, let's go have ice cream," he said, reaching over to take Natasha's hand.

"Okay!" And together, the children wandered off, hand in hand.

"Jesus Christ," Bucky muttered. "Go make sure those two lunatics stay on course. I'll bring the bags."

Words stuck in Steve's throat, so he just nodded and took off after the children, who were making with unerring accuracy for the mall's ice cream shop. They were so different, Clint and Natasha, but they were so good for each other. Steve said a silent thanks to the universe for letting his son find such a caring friend.

He and Bucky had been like that when they were kids - different as could be, but inseparable. From the day Steve met Bucky on the playground on the first day of second grade, to the day he rode away to New Jersey in the back of Abraham Erskine's station wagon, the boys had spent nearly every waking hour together. Bucky was there for Steve when things were going bad at the foster home, or when he got into fights at school, or just whenever Steve needed a friend.

Then Steve got adopted and he was so excited that he hardly realized that the price of getting a new family was losing his best friend. When he realized how much he missed Bucky, he'd tried to write to him, but things were so different in his new home and new school that he hadn't been able to keep in touch.

So much had happened in the intervening years: graduating high school, going to art school, doing an exchange to England and meeting Peggy, then meeting Sharon, then everything with his job and with Clint. Steve never expected to meet Bucky again, certainly not on an uneventful Saturday in the grocery store parking lot.

But he had. Bucky had changed so much, more than Steve could have ever imagined from that little boy with the chubby cheeks and the cowlick, but he was still Bucky.

And he was _gorgeous_.

Steve had been on the edge of telling Bucky that he was into guys too, on that day when Bucky told Steve about being gay, but something in Bucky's voice made Steve hold his tongue. Maybe it was cowardice… actually, maybe there was no _maybe_ about it. Steve still had no idea what he was doing with his life, all he knew was that he didn't want to mess things up with Bucky, and if he let his developing feelings for Bucky spill out into the open, and Bucky took things the wrong way… Steve wasn't sure he could handle that.

Not that he even knew what he wanted now, other than to spend all his time with Bucky and the kids. Sure, he had the odd occasional inappropriate thought about Bucky (in the shower, in bed, on the treadmill, in work meetings, on the subway), but Bucky had been very clear about not wanting to get into a relationship with anyone, so Steve just repressed his feelings and tried to be the best friend he could.

But then Bucky had to go and pull out some superhero parenting move and turn an emotional disaster for the kids into a heartfelt teaching moment, and Steve fell just a little bit deeper.

Up ahead, the children had reached the ice cream shop. "I want blue ice cream," Clint was saying. "And gummies."

"I want strawberry and sprinkles," add Natasha.

"All right, let's see." Steve knelt down; both children jumped at him and he managed to stand with a five-year-old on each arm. "Let's see if they have what you want."

In the few minutes it took for Bucky to join them, Clint had worked through his disappointment that the shop was out of bubble-gum ice cream, and had decided on chocolate. Natasha was too busy patting the stuffed dog to pay any attention to the discussion.

"What are you getting?" Bucky asked as he pulled his wallet out of his pocket.

"Cup of coffee." Steve tried to look innocent at Bucky's pointed stare. "And a smoothie."

"You put fruit in a milkshake, and you pretend it's healthy," Bucky grumbled as he turned to the cashier. "And two bottles of water."

It was with a great deal of excitement that the children carried their ice cream to a table; Bucky took the water and bags and plunked himself down while Steve was still gathering napkins.

"Before we eat ice cream, we drink water," Bucky was saying as Steve arrived at the table. "Three mouthfuls each."

"But I'm not thirsty," Clint said, taking a bottle from Bucky. Natasha was already chugging down the water.

"They can be small mouthfuls," Bucky conceded. "Then you can have your ice cream."

Clint shrugged and took a drink. Natasha pushed her bottle at Bucky and reached for her ice cream. "Daddy, I love ice cream so much," she said seriously. "And strawberries and sprinkles are the _best_."

"I'm glad you like it," Bucky said. He poured some water into a napkin and reached over to his daughter. "Face."

Natasha paused in her ice cream frenzy to allow Bucky to wipe her cheeks with the damp cloth. Clint was chewing his ice-cream coated gummie bears with relish, one arm in a stranglehold around the stuffed animal that had been the impetus for such strife.

As the children turned their attention on each other, Bucky sat back, stifling a pained groan. "You okay?" Steve asked sharply.

"It's this stupid arm," Bucky muttered.

"Anything I can do?"

"Nah." Bucky shifted around in his seat to grab Natasha's abandoned water. "I'll take it off when I get home."

As Bucky tilted his head back to drink, the lights caught the curve of his throat, the soft brown hair curling around the shell of his ear. Steve knew he was staring, but in that moment Bucky was like some sculpture, some untouchable masterpiece that was everything Steve ever wanted. Then the moment was broken as Bucky sat up, and he was Steve's tired, world-weary friend once more.

"What?"

Steve shrugged, trying to shake off the _want_ in his head. He reached for his smoothie. "What you said to the kids today, about respecting when someone says no, that was pretty good."

"Yeah, well." Bucky rubbed his eyes and turned closer to Steve. "I just don't want Nat ever thinking she's stuck in a situation where she can't say no."

Whatever hazy lingering thoughts were in Steve's mind were suddenly washed away by a cold wave of reality of what Bucky was talking about.

"And yeah, she's five, but…"

Bucky's hand was shaking. Just the tiniest bit, just a tremor, but Steve had seen that before, when Bucky was distressed and trying to hide it.

Bucky took a deep breath. "But if anyone tries to make her do something she doesn't want, I need her to know she's got me to back her up."

Perhaps noticing that his hand was shaking, Bucky clenched it into a fist.

"And yeah, she's gotta treat other kids the same way," Bucky went on, pulling his hands off the table. "Clint too, you know, that he can say no and stuff and that's okay."

Steve's heart was beating rapidly in his chest and he didn't know what he was missing. "No, that's good," Steve heard himself saying. "What you said… that's important. I just never thought about it before."

Meanwhile, on the other side of the table, Natasha was staring at the adults, ice cream dripping down her chin. "Daddy," she said suddenly. "Are you sad?"

"No," Bucky said immediately. "I am not sad. I am a very happy man."

"Why?" Clint asked around his spoon.

"Because I have a wonderful daughter and her wonderful friend who are kind and intelligent human beings," Bucky said seriously.

Natasha rolled her eyes. "Daddy's using big words because he's tired," she informed Clint.

"Maybe he needs a nap," Clint suggested.

"That," said Bucky, "Is the best idea I've heard all day." And he promptly put his head down on the table and let out a loud fake snore.

"Daddy!" Natasha shrieked, sliding off her chair with a thud and running around to him, pushing on his shoulder to get him moving. "Wake up!"

Clint started laughing so hard he sprayed melted chocolate ice cream all over the table, barely missing his stuffed animal.

Bucky pretended to wake up suddenly and Natasha laughed as hard as Clint, and soon they were all on their way out of the mall, for the walk back to Bucky's house in the warm summer afternoon. Everything seemed perfect.

But Steve couldn't shake the feeling that he'd missed something, something about Bucky, something lurking under what Bucky had said.

But Steve would figure it out, and he would do whatever he could for Bucky.

That's what best friends _did_.


	4. The One After Hot Chocolate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set immediately after the end of [Chapter 12 of Hands of Clay.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2143266/chapters/6383231)
> 
> Steve's POV, and a chance to see what Steve and Clint get up to when Bucky and Nat aren't around.
> 
> (This chapter brought to you by a great deal of NyQuil).

* * *

As the taillights of James's jeep faded red off into the distance, Steve leaned against the windowsill of his apartment, and wanted to murder somebody.

No, not just _somebody_. Steve wanted to kill the man who had hurt Bucky so badly, so many years before. He wanted to kill the man who had made Bucky suffer, with such an intensity that it scared him.

"Daddy?"

Steve took a deep breath as he turned away from the window. "Yeah, buddy?"

Clint sat at the table, the remains of his after-dinner hot chocolate ringing his mouth. "Can we read more Harry Potter?" the little boy asked, blinking sleepily at Steve through his glasses.

Steve pasted a smile on his face. "Not tonight. Come on, we need to get you into the bath, and we're already past your bedtime."

Clint protested that he did not need a bath, that he could just play in the sprinkler the next day at Natasha's house, but at Steve's urging he drank the last of his hot chocolate and let himself be hustled into the bathroom.

While Steve ran a bath, Clint put his glasses and hearing aid on the counter out of danger, then shucked out of his clothes. There was a thin layer of grime on his skin, from a long afternoon in the dust of Coney Island while covered with sunscreen. Steve could even see dirt in his hair.

There was a stirring in the back of his head, to demand why Clint always got so dirty when no one's else's kid did; why Clint always got himself into situations no normal kid would. But Steve slammed the door on those thoughts almost as soon as they came at him. Clint _was_ a normal kid, just a little more rambunctious and active than other kids. Just because he had hearing problems and sight problems, that didn't mean anything.

The anger about Bucky was still burbling in Steve's chest and he knew he needed to stop. Right now, the only thing that mattered in the entire world was Clint. Bucky was driving Natasha home and he was going to be _fine_.

"Can I have my duck scrubby?" Clint asked, pulling Steve back to the present with a bump.

"Sure thing." Steve swished his hand through the bathwater, to make sure it wasn't too hot, then said, "Hop in, I'll get the duck."

Clint climbed into the tub and sat down with a sploosh that slopped water over the tub's edge. Steve grabbed a dirty towel out of the hamper and tossed it on the floor to cover the spill. "Can we have the _purple_ goo?" Clint asked, looking at Steve with hopeful eyes.

"We can't have the duck scrubby without the purple goo, can we?" Steve pulled the plastic bucket of Clint's bath supplies out from under the sink; the duck and frog shower poufs, the lavender shower gel Clint had thrown a fit over in the store, the no-tears shampoo and the soap-on-a-rope Steve had received as a gag gift at the Stark Christmas party the winter before and that Clint had claimed in utter glee. Steve thought it smelled like a piña colada but Clint adored it.

Sitting on the floor beside the tub, Steve handed Clint the duck pouf and let the boy to dunk it under the water before holding out the shower gel. Clint solemnly waited for Steve to add a squirt of violently purple goo to the pouf before smooshing the gel in and rubbing the foam all over himself.

Letting out a sigh, Steve put the bottle down and slumped against the tub's side. This was another one of Clint's joys, playing in the bath with his duck scrubby and the purple foam. From the conversations on the playground with the other mothers, Steve had deduced that normal boys—no, _other_ boys, didn't have much interest in bathing or personal hygiene. And yet here was his kid, happy as a clam, scrubbing away in the bathtub after a long and active day.

And for Steve, a horrifying day. He would never have guessed that Bucky had gone through such a terrifying thing when he was fifteen, being pressured into a relationship with a much older guy, then blackmailed and _(his mind didn't want to use the word but it was the unvarnished truth)_ raped. Because that was what Bucky had described; the horror in Bucky's voice as he described being drugged at a party and waking up to a lost night of memories; then to a month of being forced into having sex so the goddamn pervert didn't out Bucky to his parents.

Steve remembered being fifteen. He had shot up like a weed in New Jersey, with the good cooking and quiet safety in Abraham's house. He'd had a couple of crushes, had even taken a girl (what had her name been? Miranda, from American history class) out for an ice cream during which he'd forgotten how to chew with his mouth closed and had tripped over his own feet getting on the bus home. He had been a clumsy, confused kid who was faintly starting to feel like he had a home, just as Bucky was being kicked out of his.

And Steve hadn't been around to help; had been so wrapped up in his world that he hadn't kept up with his best friend in the whole world. Would it have made any difference? If Steve and Bucky had stayed friends? Maybe if they had, Bucky could have told Steve he was in trouble, that he needed help, a place to stay. Maybe Steve could have helped.

But he hadn't. They hadn't stayed friends. Steve had been so focused on building a new life in New Jersey that he'd dropped Bucky cold, and that meant Bucky was completely alone when that goddamned perverted psychopath had moved in on him at the youth centre.

Meanwhile, Clint was making himself a gel-foam beard. "Daddy," he said in all seriousness. "When do I get old enough to have a beard?"

It took Steve a few moments to come back to himself. "Huh. Well, not for a while. You have to hit puberty first."

Clint had resumed his duck scrubby attack on his legs. "I don't hit," he scolded his father. "It's not nice."

Steve opened his mouth, closed it, and shook his head with a smile. "I meant, when you reach puberty."

"When's that?" Clint lifted his left foot out of the water to waggle his toes in the air.

"I don't exactly know. When you're about thirteen or fourteen, maybe." Steve steeled himself, in case Clint asked more about puberty. Steve had read all the books about how to talk to kids about the biological parts of growing up, after a memorable afternoon when Clint was three and had demanded to know where babies came from. But Clint just went back to playing with the soap foam on his face.

"When I am fourteen I will grow a beard," Clint said with decisiveness. "And I'll grow my hair long, and have a suit, and have a big house, and be able to fix _anything_!"

"Anything, huh?"

Clint nodded, his foam beard waggling. "James can fix _anything_. Yesterday, the bathroom door handle came off and he _fixed_ it."

"The door handle just came loose?"

Clint turned wide, blameless eyes at Steve. "It just did! And James let me hold the screws while he fixed it! Natasha helped too but then she left and I helped more."

In spite of the burning anger in his head, Steve's heart softened at how happy Clint was, at spending time with Bucky. "That must have been very fun," he said, reaching for the shower head.

"It was." Clint let Steve wipe the foam beard off with a washcloth. "And then today, at lunch, we had coleslaw and I got to stir in the goop."

"Coleslaw?" Steve repeated. This was new. Clint had doubled down on his vegetable avoidance campaign, and had refused to touch a vegetable in over a week. "What was in it?"

"Crunch and goop," Clint said with relish. He let Steve wet his hair, then took on the duty of rubbing in the shampoo. "And raisins, but I picked those out."

"Crunch and goop sounds good." Steve let Clint play with the shampoo for a few moments before motioning for the boy to lean back to rinse the soap from his hair. Clint trustingly closed his eyes and leaned back against Steve's right hand, while the shower head held in Steve's left hand streamed warm water over Clint's head.

In a few minutes, the shampoo was gone. Holding his duck scrubby, Clint reached down to pull the plug out of the drain, then stood for one final rinse with the shower head to get rid of the lingering soap foam.

As the water drained away, Steve turned off the taps and put the shower head back where it belonged. Clint handed Steve the ducky, for Steve to hang to dry, then let loose a wide yawn.

"Almost in bed," Steve said as he handed a small hand towel to Clint. While Clint rubbed the towel over his wet hair, Steve retrieved a large fluffy towel from the cupboard and wrapped it bodily around Clint. "Okay, up we go!"

Hefting Clint over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, Steve retrieved the boy's glasses and hearing aid with a practiced hand on the way out of the bathroom and into the apartment's only bedroom. He put Clint on the bed and went over to the small dresser to get Clint's pajamas. As Steve was doing this, Clint fought free of the towel and pulled the bed's top sheet down.

"Have I ever been up this late?" Clint asked, kicking the towel to the ground.

Steve brought over a pair of clean PJs for the boy and held them out. "Not since you were a little baby," Steve said as he picked up the towel. "You used to wake up a lot then."

He stopped talking while Clint pulled the pajama top over his head; Clint couldn't hear well when he had things over his ears and Steve was working hard to not talk when Clint would have a hard time hearing him. It was difficult, sometimes, to hold his words until Clint was looking at him, or close enough to hear without Steve having to yell.

But he was _trying_ , and he just hoped that it was a long time before Clint's hearing got any worse to make him need to change his behaviour again.

Finally, Clint had the pajama top on the right way, but he pushed the bottoms away. "It's too hot," he said, slipping off the bed and going to the dresser.

"What else are you going to wear?" Steve asked, picking up the pajama bottoms from the crumpled heap on the bed.

Clint emerged from the dresser holding his prized Superman underwear. "This means I'll dream Superman dreams!" Clint exclaimed, fitting his feet through the openings in the underpants. "I like Superman dreams."

"What are Superman dreams?" Steve asked, helping Clint climb back into bed.

"When I dream like I'm flying!" Clint held out his hands in what was unmistakably a Superman flight pose. "Like when I was on the roller coaster, and I was flying!"

"That was pretty fun." Steve made sure Clint's hearing aid was turned off and placed it in the special little box on the bedside table. "I'm glad we got to go on the roller coaster today."

As he said it, Steve was again reminded of what Bucky had told him that day, what he had been through, who he had seen, and it was all Steve could do to keep the rage at the past from showing on his face.

Something must have shown through, however, for Clint said, "Is James gonna be okay?"

"Of course he is," Steve said, reaching over to grab Floppy, Clint's much-loved stuffed dog, and put it on the boy's chest. The little boy embraced the raggedy toy with all his might. "Like he said, sometimes anyone can get scared, but if they have people around who love them, they can carry on."

Clint turned onto his side, his bad ear pressed into the pillow. "Maybe he needs Floppy," Clint suggested. "So he won't be scared."

The little boy was so earnest, his eyes so big and trusting, that all Steve could do was to ruffle Clint's hair and say, "Let's take Floppy with us tomorrow and you can offer, okay?"

"Okay." Clint's eyes crossed slightly as he buried his nose in Floppy's patchy fur. "But maybe only for the day. Floppy will get sad if he doesn't come home with me."

"Good idea." Steve bent over to kiss Clint's still-damp hair. "Are you ready for bed now?"

"No, story first."

"Okay." Steve slid off the bed to sit on the floor, making himself comfortable. Sometimes Clint's idea of a bedtime story took a few minutes, other times he was there for half an hour. "What's the story tonight?"

"There was a little boy who went to roller coaster," Clint said immediately, and Steve quickly picked up the tale.

"Once upon a time, there was a little boy who went to ride the roller coaster," Steve said. As he spoke, Clint reached out for his father's hand, his little fingers wrapping around Steve's. "And that little boy's name was Clint."

"This is a good story," Clint said, snuggling down.

"And that little boy had a best friend," Steve said, returning to the running theme in Clint's bedtime stories for the past months. "His best friend's name was Natasha. And together, they went to ride the roller coaster."

"The big one," Clint interjected "Not the little one for babies. The big one for big kids."

"And together they went to the big roller coaster," Steve went on. "And they sat in the very front car and when the roller coaster started they went up, up, up to the top of the first rise, and then what happened?"

Clint took a big breath. "At the top, the roller coaster went flying!" he exclaimed. "And they flewed over all the people and up into the clouds!"

"Where did they go?"

"All the way to the clouds!" Clint pointed at the ceiling. "And then they flew all the way to the mountain!"

"What happened at the mountain?"

"They fell down with a smash!" Clint demonstrated the catastrophe by slapping his hand onto the blanket. "But they were okay."

"What did Clint and Natasha do then?"

"They went to the mountain," Clint said. "They walked and they ate berries and they saw a deer. But then they saw a bear!"

"A bear?" Steve echoed. "Oh no!"

"But it was just a baby bear," Clint said. "But then they saw the mommy bear!"

"Did they stay and watch the bears?"

"No, they ran away!" Clint gripped Floppy in a tight hug. "And they went back to the roller coaster and got in and they flew all the way back to home!"

"Oh boy," Steve said, wiping his brow in an exaggerated movement. "That was close."

"Uh huh. Then the roller coaster landed on top of the bad man and the little boy and his friend got out and found their daddies and then everyone had ice cream."

The statement was delivered in such a matter-of-factly that Steve nearly missed what Clint said. He stared at his son, for once at a complete loss for words. "Clint, what are you talking about?"

"Like Dorothy." Clint moved Floppy underneath his pillow. "She dropped a house on the bad witch and they gave her a party and new shoes."

As Steve tried to think of something to say, other than _we do not drop houses on people_ , Clint was settling down for sleep, closing his eyes and curling up into a ball under the covers. Eventually, Steve just gave up and leaned over to pull the sheet over Clint's shoulders.

"There's no bad men coming for anyone," he said before kissing Clint's cheek. "You sleep tight, buddy."

Clint wiggled his nose. "Someday I'm gonna ride the big roller coaster," he said softly, his voice slurring with sleep.

"I know you are." Quietly, Steve stood up. He left the pajama bottoms lying on the floor; he'd deal with that and the rest of Clint's room the next day. Taking the wet towel with him, he went out and closed Clint's bedroom door behind him.

This left him staring at his empty  apartment. The takeout boxes were piled in the sink, the small table still covered with the evening's hot chocolate cups. Combined with the usual mess from a little boy and his single dad living in confined quarters, Steve suddenly hated everything in the place. It was too small, too far away from his work, nowhere near enough playgrounds or open spaces for Clint. It had been fine when Clint was a baby and Steve was working for peanuts, but now, it wasn't enough for Steve to offer his kid.

Certainly, it wasn't anything like Bucky's house. The house in Brooklyn Heights, with its four levels  and the little back yard with the vegetable boxes and grass for the kids to play in, was perfect, in a good neighbourhood with parks and quiet streets, and so much closer to the subway into the city. And it wasn't just the house; Bucky had made it into a home for him and Natasha, with the house laid out just right for a little girl and her dad. Clint loved the house and the nearby parks, he told Steve so on a regular basis.

And all Steve had was this crummy apartment on the far end of Brooklyn.

He didn't know how he was going to handle getting Clint to his new school, so close to Bucky's place, come September. The school fees were going to take a big bite out of his bank account, negating the option of moving, even if he could find a place closer to the school. Brooklyn was gentrifying so fast; there was no way he'd be able to find a two-bedroom apartment for anything close to affordable.

If things had been different with him and Bucky, he might have asked if Bucky was interested in renting out the third floor to him and Clint. But Steve was pretty sure he was developing a full-blow crush on his best friend and that just complicated everything in Steve's head.

Even before he'd learned what had happened to Bucky.

Steve took a deep breath, then another. He couldn't change the past, couldn't go back and help Bucky when Bucky needed help the most. Even now, Steve had no idea how to do anything for Bucky.

Looking around at the dirty apartment once more, Steve straightened his backbone and set to work.

Cleaning up the mess left by Clint and their afternoon visitors took a while, but after an hour and a half, Steve dropped the last dirty sock into the hamper and turned out the bathroom light. The apartment was as clean as it was going to get without vacuuming. Trying to stretch out the ache in his back, Steve peeked in to check on Clint, but the boy was still fast asleep, with Floppy poking out from under his pillow.

Lucky kid.

He closed the bedroom door before going over to the couch to open his laptop, to get a little extra work done before he went to bed. The Stark Foundation's donor gala was on Friday and while Steve had managed to bow out of the actual event, he still had to make sure his team had everything under control. Since Tony tended to thrown his own money at these events and claim them as a tax write-off, there were lots of people focusing on the details so Steve didn't have to.

Steve's phone sat beside his computer. He picked it up and looked at the screen, not really sure he knew what he was hoping to find, but he had no missed calls or texts. Bucky hadn't tried to contact him.

Bucky was probably busy, Steve thought as he put his phone down. It had been a long day and getting Natasha home and to bed would be no easy chore; the girl had been very worried about her dad.

Most of all, Bucky didn't need Steve bothering him. If he was sleeping, then good. If he was awake, he didn't need Steve poking at him and pestering him.

In spite of all that, Steve picked up the phone and was halfway to calling Bucky when his common sense caught up with him. It was past midnight. What would he say if he did call Bucky? How you doing? Steve already knew the answer to that one. Keeping your spirits up? That was asinine. How's Natasha? Weak. There was no way Steve could call Bucky and make it seem like it was about anything else than Steve's own worries.

So Steve didn't call Bucky. He called Bruce instead.

It wasn't a big gamble; Bruce Banner was a night owl and on weeknights was usually in the R&D labs in Stark Tower until well after midnight. Bruce and Steve had met through work, and found that they enjoyed each other's company and conversation. Steve had been there for Bruce to talk to during the last days of Bruce's divorce and Bruce had always said if Steve needed anyone to return the favor…

"Lab Fifteen, Banner here."

"Hey Bruce, it's Steve."

"Everything okay?" Bruce asked, shifting out of work-mode. "Is Clint okay?"

"Yeah, he's fine." Steve slumped down on the couch. "It's just… you got a minute?"

"Yeah, I got a few." There was a rattling sound on the other end of the line. "The computer's started crunching the new numbers for the morning, so I'm all yours."

Steve stared up at the ceiling. "You ever find out something that happened to someone, and just want to _do_ something about it?"

"Yeah." Bruce's voice held hollow amusement. "A couple of times. Do you want to talk about it?"

"I… I don't know," Steve admitted. "There's this friend of mine, I knew him before I was adopted and we met again recently. I hadn't seen him since I was twelve, and a lot of stuff happened since then."

"And the reason I'm getting this call at one in the morning is…"

"I found out something happened today and I just… I don't know."

"Something bad?"

"Yeah." Steve could remember the agony in Bucky's voice as he described everything that had happened to him, clear as if Bucky was sitting right there beside him. "Real bad. And I want to _do_ something but…"

Bruce was quiet for a few moments. "Could doing anything now, make any difference to what happened?"

"No."

"The guy it happened to, he's an adult now?"

"Yeah."

"Did he tell you he wanted you to do something?"

"No. He said…" Steve closed his eyes, the memory of that afternoon seared into his brain. "He said it was a long time ago and to leave it alone."

Bruce sighed. "Will you take some advice?"

"You want me to leave it alone?" Steve said sharply, opening his eyes again.

"You need to be careful," Bruce said instead. "Is this guy important to you?"

Of course he was, Steve wanted to shout. That was why he'd called Bruce at one in the morning on a Wednesday. Or Thursday, now. Forcing himself to speak quietly, Steve said, "Yeah, I guess he is."

"And he asked you to leave it alone."

This time, Steve was the one who was silent.

"Do you need me to finish?"

"No," Steve said, suddenly feeling very tired. Bruce was right. What Bucky had told Steve, that was something Bucky hadn't told anyone else. Bucky _trusted_ him, and Steve couldn't turn around and go against what Bucky wanted. Bucky's trust had already been betrayed too often in his life, both by the guy who raped him and by his own family, kicking him out on the street when he'd tried to ask for help.

Sitting up, Steve made a promise to himself. He'd never do anything to betray Bucky's trust in him. He'd be there for Bucky, support him in whatever he wanted to do.

It may have only been a few months since they found each other again, but Steve would do anything for Bucky. Anything.

"Not to change the subject," Bruce said, interrupting Steve's thoughts, "But have you checked your email tonight?"

"No, why?" Steve asked, already reaching to turn on his laptop.

"An additional guest to the party on Friday," Bruce said. "Which, by the way, I'll be avoiding."

"What's going on?"

"You'll see." Bruce cleared his throat. "You need anything else?"

"No," Steve said. "I need to think a few things over. You know how it is."

"I do."

"And… thanks. I know it's late and all."

"I'm always around," Bruce said. "Just… be careful, Steve."

"Aren't I always?"

"See you tomorrow." With that, Bruce hung up.

Steve put his phone down and clicked on the mail icon on his laptop. The conversation with Bruce hadn't exactly helped, but at least Steve had managed to come to one conclusion. He'd do what Bucky wanted. He wouldn't try to track down the guy Bucky had seen at Coney Island. He would leave Bucky to take whatever action he wanted, and support him the whole way.

That did not mean that Steve was going to let this go. He was never going to be able to forget the pain in Bucky's voice.

Then he saw his email, and Steve swore out loud.

 ** _Stranger Danger!_** Read the title of Tony's message. Clicking open the email, Steve understood why Bruce would be avoiding the event. _Dr. Sideshow is descending upon us!_ Tony wrote. _All hands on deck and that means you, Rogers! Pepper has actual work stuff to do and if I get within thirty feet of Stephen Strange I'm going to commit a felony so you need to dress nice and do your song and dance to keep him happy. Try to convince him to fork over more money to the Foundation. Anything I have is yours as long as you keep him out of my face._

"Fuck," Steve said again. This blew his plans for Friday out of the water. He had everything set – Clint would be at Bucky's all day while Steve was in the city getting things arranged, then Steve would borrow a car from the motor pool, drive to pick Clint up for his archery class, then afterwards drop Clint off at home with their neighbour Naomi for a few hours while Steve went back to Manhattan for the opening of the gala. If he played his time right, he'd hoped to be back in time to put Clint to bed.

Now that was out the window. From the sounds of things, Steve was going to be on Strange duty well into the night hours. What was he going to do with Clint now?

The first idea in his head, of course, was to ask Bucky to watch Clint, but it was such an imposition, how could he? Bucky had done so much for him and Clint that summer already. But to ask Bucky to take Clint to his archery class and then watch him overnight? It was too much.

Steve took a deep breath. He didn't have a lot of options. He would ask Bucky for the favour, then if Bucky said no, Steve would bring Clint with him to the gala at Stark Tower. Clint could hang out in his office, maybe spend time with Bruce. It wasn't a great solution, but Steve would manage it.

But it wouldn't be good for Clint. Steve rubbed his eyes as he tried to think. Far better for Clint to be in a familiar place overnight, rather than bunking down in Steve's cramped office in Stark Tower.

So Steve would ask Bucky in the morning if he could watch Clint over Friday night. It would be best for Clint, and that was the most important thing to Steve.

But how could be make that up to Bucky?

Looking at Tony's email again, Steve had a sudden idea. _Anything I have is yours_ , Tony had written. Well, Steve's original plans for Clint's birthday had already been thrown for a loop by a phone call earlier that week with Abraham, so he'd been trying to think of something special to do for Clint's sixth birthday. He'd thrown around ideas of going out for pizza, inviting Natasha and Bucky along, but Tony's offer gave Steve another option.

Hitting reply on the email, Steve wrote, _fine, but I need a week off at the beginning of August and the keys to your beach house in the Hamptons,_ and hit send.

He would invite Bucky on a few days' vacation, Steve thought as he sat back. They would take the kids, spend time on the beach, swimming in the house's pool, hang out doing nothing. They could get away from the city, just the four of them.

Too energized to sit still, Steve got up to get a glass of water. This was actually a really good plan. They could all go, take a break from New York in the summer. With the kids there, it would be a lot of fun.

Spending time with his best friend, that was all it was, Steve told himself. A chance for two guys to get away from it all, and let their kids have a nice week at the seaside. Clint would be over the moon and Steve would bet that Natasha would like it as well. A nice, quiet week, away from the chaos of life in New York.

He didn't even have to wait for Tony's answer (he'd spent years interacting with Tony Stark; even if the man came back with a _no_ (or more likely, a _hell no_ ), Steve could turn that into a yes, or at the very least a stay in the Stark's enormous beachfront mansion's coach house) to know that he'd suggest this to Bucky the next morning when dropping Clint off, after asking if Bucky could watch Clint the following evening.

Steve might not know what to say to Bucky about the past, but he would be there for Bucky, support him in whatever he wanted to do. All that he could do was to be there to move on to the next day, and the one after that, and be there in case Bucky needed him.

Bucky was his best friend, and Steve would not let anything or anybody mess with that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Clint's [duck scrubby as found on Amazon:](http://www.amazon.com/Ayygift-Scubber-Bathing-Shower-Sponge/dp/B00K4SHJNO)
> 
>  
> 
> Next Hands of Clay chapter probably done by Sunday :)


	5. The One On Easter Morning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Easter Sunday, and Bucky thinks he may just be happy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note/Setting: This piece takes place after the end of Hand of Clay (except for the epilogue), and presupposes that Steve and Bucky finally get together (which of course they do). No spoilers for the rest of Hands of Clay, but some teasers about upcoming drama.
> 
> I guess I woke up this morning and really, really wanted to write about Easter.

* * *

"Hey. You awake?"

James opened one eye, wondering what was wrong. The bedroom was dark, only the faintest hint of light coming through the curtains. The house was silent, and James relaxed back into the soft warmth of the bed. The kids weren't awake yet.

An arm curled around James' stomach as the man in the bed cuddled up against James. "When do you think the kids'll be up?" Steve asked sleepily, pressing a line of soft kisses up the nape of James' neck.

James groaned, burying his face in the pillow. Steve shifted his weight to lay on James. "Goddamn it, Steve," James said. "They weren't even up this early at Christmas."

"Christmas is different," Steve said. If James hadn't had his eyes closed, he'd have rolled them. "Easter is chocolate. Clint has a sixth-sense about chocolate."

Giving up entirely on the idea of sleeping in past six on a Sunday, James rolled over. "Clint has a good sense of smell," he pointed out. In the dim light, he could make out Steve's face as the man propped himself up on his elbow. "If he's going to wake up early, it's because the whole damned house smells like chocolate after what you did last night."

"What the Easter Bunny did," Steve corrected James. This time, James really did roll his eyes.

"It's only five in the morning," he said, tugging on Steve's arm. "The kids aren't going to be up for at least half an hour."

"Half an hour, huh?" Steve let himself be pulled down, at the same time sliding his thigh between James' legs. "What do you think we can get up to in half an hour?"

"Oh, I don't know," James whispered against Steve's cheek. "Why don't you kiss me and find out?"

* * *

Fifty-five minutes later, James and Steve sat in the second-floor hallway, dressed and waiting for the day's events to get under way.

"I wonder when the kids will get up," Steve said in a whisper, checking to make sure his camera was ready. "Last Sunday, they got up before seven."

"Last weekend, they didn't stay up late watching movies," James whispered back. In anticipation of a morning around the house, he had left his prosthesis on its charging station. In the months since Steve and Clint moved in with him and Natasha, James was finally starting to accept the idea that Steve really didn't mind if James wore the metal arm or not. _Whatever you want, I want,_ was the phrase that still rang in James' memory, after that strange not-quite-a-fight on Christmas morning.

"But they'll be excited about Easter," Steve countered.

"Why? It's never been a big deal with Nat. And when I was talking to Clint yesterday, he said that it was okay, but that was all."

Steve shifted his weight on the cold hardwood floor. "It was hard to make Easter a big deal when we lived in the apartment. Not really anywhere to hide stuff."

James leaned against Steve's shoulder, wondering rather selfishly (it was a cold morning outside, after the long winter) if he could curl up in Steve's lap for the wait. "That explains why you went crazy with the eggs."

"Shut up," Steve said, poking James' leg. "I didn't go crazy."

"There's currently more chocolate in my house than in a Hershey's factory," James said. "You went all the way to Queens to buy the kids special baskets."

"A lot of people do that."

"Do I have to remind you what you've stashed down in the laundry room?"

Far from being abashed, Steve just grinned. "Yeah, I know, it's going to be great." He put his arm around James' shoulders as they settled back to wait.

Letting out a huff, James rested his head against Steve's neck. In spite of the cold, the anticipation of seeing the children's excitement buzzed in James' chest. Everything was so exciting to two six-year-olds, and for James too, as the kids were now old enough to understand more about life.

A sudden chill rolled down James' spine. It very nearly hadn't happened like this. He'd nearly lost everything the previous fall, and some nights he still woke in a cold sweat, terrified that it hadn't been a dream, that it had been real, and Natasha--  


"Hey." Steve's voice cut into James' mounting panic. "Hey."

"Hey," James said back. He put his hand on Steve's knee, centring himself with touch. Steve was real, was here, _wanted_ to be here. Down the hall, Clint and Natasha were both sleeping in their respective bedrooms, warm and safe, healthy and whole. "Sometimes, you know, I just think…"

"I know." Steve's voice was low, quiet, and it helped James focus like nothing else. "Me too. Sometimes."

They sat like that, for a few minutes, until they heard motion in one of the bedrooms. Steve reached for his camera as Clint's bedroom door opened, and the little boy stopped dead.

In front of Clint's bedroom door sat a purple Easter basket, empty save for a brightly decorated card with the word _Clint_ on the front.

"Oh wow!" Clint exclaimed. He dashed back into his room and re-emerged wearing his glasses. "Oh wow!"

Scarcely looking at the adults, Clint snatched up his basket and ran across the hall to Natasha's door. He pounded on the door.

"Hey, Natasha!" Clint yelled. "Come look! It's the Easter bunny!"

Sounds of grumbling complaints came from within Natasha's room. In a few moments, however, the little girl appeared, her hair flying every which way. "Why are you yelling so _early_?" she demanded crossly.

Clint brandished his basket and card. "It's the Easter bunny!"

Natasha's mouth dropped open in surprise. "It is?"

"Yes!" Clint backed up to point at the red Easter basket, nearly identical to his own, beside Natasha's door.

Natasha bent over to pick up the basket. She pulled out her own Easter card. "What's it say?" she asked.

"I haven't looked."

Steve cleared his throat. "Why don't you two look at your cards together?" he suggested from behind the camera.

"Okay," Clint agreed. Natasha rubbed at her eyes while Clint opened his card. "Hah-pee… Happy… Easter!"

"And then look, it says ‘Clint'," Natasha pointed out.

"Nat, honey, look at your own card," James said.

Natasha sat down on the floor, set her basket in her lap, and opened her card. "Happy Easter, Natasha," she read.

Clint, who was sounding out his own card, suddenly let out a yell. "Dad! It says, ‘it is time for an Easter egg hunt'!"

"And then it says, ‘ready, set, go!' " Natasha scrambled to her feet. "Where do we look first?"

Clint was already scanning the hallway. With a yelp, he pointed down the hall, to where the stairs to the lower levels met the walls. "Look! An _egg_!"

The children stampeded towards the small, brightly colored objects. Steve was already on his feet, leaving James to haul himself up to follow.

"Look!" Clint was yelling. "Daddy, look!"

"There are four eggs!" Natasha exclaimed. "Two and two!"

"Looks like the Easter bunny knew there were two kids here," James said. "Why don't you put those eggs in your basket and we can look for more?"

"There are more?" Clint asked breathlessly as Natasha dove for the eggs. She put two in her basket, then the other two in Clint's.

"What do you think?" James asked, and pointed down the stairs.

Natasha gasped, while Clint stared in open-mouthed amazement. All down the stairs and around the living room were small clusters of brightly coloured Easter eggs. James, who had been up until one in the morning hiding the eggs with Steve, smiled as the children tore down the stairs, running to each successive Easter egg stash with mounting excitement.

"Just think what they'll be like after they eat the chocolate," he said to Steve. The other man just grinned.

All told, it took the children twenty minutes to find all the eggs in the living room. Each stash held treats in multiples of two, so the children would each get an equal share. Chocolate, jelly beans, gummy candies, it all went into the baskets.

After a few minutes of not finding any new candies, Natasha dragged herself and her basket, now too full for a little girl to lift, over to James. "Daddy, this is the _best_ Easter," she said. Her cheeks were flushed and her breathing a little laboured. When James put his hand on her forehead, however, her skin felt normal. "Don't you think it's the best Easter?"

"I do," James said. It was hard to speak around the sudden lump in his throat. "Because we've got Steve and Clint here. And because I have you."

Natasha let herself be drawn in for a hug and a kiss on the cheek. "You're silly in the mornings," Natasha informed her father. "You should sleep more. Then you won't be silly."

"Sorry to disappoint, but I'm always going to be silly," James said, keeping his arm around Natasha. Her cheeks were filling out again, after the disastrous events of the fall. James was struck by a memory of Natasha lying in that hospital bed, pale and motionless, and he had to blink past the sudden remembered terror. "Always. Until you're two hundred and ten."

Natasha giggled at this. "That's pretty old," she said. "Even older than you." She wiggled free of James' embrace. "Even older than _Santa Claus_."

Clint, who was in the middle of organizing his Easter eggs by size, let out a yell. "Hey, look at that!"

"What?" Natasha demanded, bolting to Clint's side.

Clint pointed at the little paper arrows taped to the floor by the staircase. "It's pointing down!"

James stood and went over to the arrows, which had not been there five minutes before. "Do you want to investigate?" he asked the kids. Steve had the camera out again and was filming the entire scene.

"Yeah, let's go together," Natasha said. She took Clint's hand, and together they walked down the steps to the basement, James and Steve bringing up the rear.

"Are there more eggs?" Clint asked.

"We'll find out," Steve said. "Look, the arrows turn left."

James sighed, but held his tongue. Sometimes, Steve was even more into this stuff than the kids were.

The last arrow lay on the floor, in front of the closed laundry room door. Natasha and Clint looked at each other. Then they turned to James. "Daddy, you go first," Natasha urged.

"That's right, send the old man into danger," James grumbled. "All right, you two stand here."

He positioned the children to the best vantage point, then opened the laundry room door. The kids stared, too shocked to move for a moment, then Clint jumped up and down.

"A _bike!_ " he screamed. "The Easter bunny brought me a _bike_!"

"And me too!" Natasha yelled joyously. The children rushed into the laundry room, where two small bicycles sat, each festooned with a ribbon (one purple, one red). "Oh, Daddy, look! A bike!"

Clint patted his bicycle's seat with a gentle hand, while Natasha got on her bicycle as if she'd been doing it for years. "I always wanted a bike," Clint breathed. "Big boys have bikes."

"Sure do," Steve said. "What do you guys think, was this a fun Easter?"

Clint and Natasha looked at their fathers, fairly glowing with excitement. "This is better than Christmas!" Clint said solemnly.

"But not better than Disneyland," Natasha hastened to add. She got off her bike. "Daddy, do you get a bike too?"

"Nah," James said. "But I can run along side you guys."

"I have an idea," Steve said, switching off his camera. "How about we go upstairs and have a good breakfast, then we take those bikes to the park so you can practice riding them?"

This suggestion was met with enthusiastic cheers.

After James and Steve lugged the children's bicycles upstairs, after the kids had hauled their Easter baskets into the kitchen, and after breakfast was nearly done, Steve leaned over to James to speak in his ear. "So, what do you think?"

James took a moment to consider. The kitchen was warm and smelled of good food and even better coffee, the children were chattering over their Easter booty and their plans for the day, and Steve was sitting next to him.

After everything they had gone through, after James had come so close to losing everything, this was more than James had ever dreamed of.

He put his hand over Steve's. "I think I'm happy," he whispered.

The smile that spread over Steve's face was perfect. "Me too."

"Hey!" Natasha said sharply, interrupting the moment before James could move any closer to Steve. "No kissing at the table!"

James sighed. "Why not?" he asked.

"Because kissing's _gross_ ," Natasha said. Clint made a face in agreement. "Don't do gross things at the table. We _eat_ here."

"Oh yeah?" Quickly, James moved to press a noisy kiss against Steve's cheek. The children squealed in protest. "Quiet down, you'll live."

"I want to eat my chocolate now," Clint said, moving on. "All of it. Right now."

"I'm going to save mine," Natasha said. She patted her Eater basket lovingly. "But maybe I'll eat one now."

"Yeah, me too," Clint said, changing his mind. "Which one do you want to eat first?"

As the children involved Steve in a serious discussion on the merits of chocolate versus jelly beans, James sat back in his chair. For so long, he and Natasha had been alone, a small little family on their own. But now, with Steve and Clint as part of their family…

James didn't know if anyone on earth could ever have been happier than he was, right at that moment.


	6. The One at the Start

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set in the middle of Chapter 1 of Hands of Clay. Steve's POV on seeing Bucky again for the first time.
> 
> This came out of an ask on Tumblr where someone wanted to see "Steve's perspective when walking in the parking lot some kid shoots him with a nerf - I've always wondered what he thought about that initial moment."

* * *

It had been a long morning at the museum, and Clint was more than a little antsy, but Steve had promised his little boy that they would have his special mac and cheese that night for dinner and that meant getting off the subway early to stop in at Trader Joes to load up on cheese supplies. 

Clint had been relatively okay with the delay, given that he had his brand new toy archery set with him. Steve had been a little reluctant to let Clint outside with the thing, but they'd talked about how important it was never _ever_ to aim an arrow, even a suction-cup one, at anyone, even in fun.

Inside the store, Clint stuck close to Steve as they perused the cheese selection, then went together to find the dairy section. Mostly, though, Clint was content to look around at all the people and the products, chattering about the dinosaurs they had seen that day.

As they passed the bread section, Steve was momentarily distracted by a wailing child. A little red-headed girl, smaller than Clint, was in the process of being picked up by her father. Then Clint was tugging on Steve's hand, and he bent his head to listen to his son talking earnestly about the triceratops and how the triceratops was probably the best dinosaur, even better than stegosaurus, right?

They made it through the checkout and were standing in the parking lot when Steve was struck with a sudden qualm. "Hey, Clint, give me a minute," he said, fumbling for the shopping list in his pocket. Clint obediently waited, holding his toy bow and absently playing with the draw string.

Quickly, Steve scanned his list. He'd remembered everything except for parsley, and there was no way Steve was paying seven dollars for organic dried parsley when he could get the regular kind for a buck at the bodega down on the corner by his place.

Satisfied, Steve looked down at Clint. "I'm pretty sure that's everything on the list," he said. "We should be getting back—"

Something smacked him in the face.

His first thought was _bird_ (he'd been attacked by a small bird once while running in England and remembered the feeling) but then Clint pulled a section-cup arrow from his quiver and was aiming it at a tall man over by the shopping carts. "We're under attack!" Clint yelled, drawing back the string on his bow.

A lot of things happened in the next few seconds. The man spun around, holding the little redheaded girl from the store, a nerf gun in her hand. At the same time, Steve reached out for Clint, desperate to keep his five-year-old from committing felony assault with a weapon in the Trader Joe's parking lot.

"Clint, put it down, now!" Steve demanded. As Clint lowered the bow, Steve snatched away the arrow. "We talked about this!"

"I'm sorry," Clint said. A few feet away, little girl scrambled up on to the man's shoulder, causing the man to drop his groceries.

Damn it. "We'll talk about this at home," Steve said. He should do something to help the man, even if his daughter had shot Steve in the face. Squaring his shoulders, Steve looked at the man, preparing to apologize. The man was in the process of setting his daughter on her feet and Steve got the first look at the man's face, and his stomach dropped.

It _couldn't be_.

It had been twenty years, but the longer Steve looked, the more he thought he recognized the man.

"Bucky?"

The man's head shot up and his eyes met Steve's, and all of Steve's hesitation fell away. It _was_ Bucky! The last time he'd seen Bucky, James Barnes, they'd both been twelve years old. Bucky had had chipmunk cheeks and was way taller than Steve, who had been a skinny tiny punk until puberty hit him like a freight train at fourteen.

Now, Bucky was tall and muscular underneath a worn plaid shirt, a square stubbly jaw, with nearly shoulder-length brown hair. As the shock of realization wore off, Steve felt his knees get weak and his stomach flip over.

Bucky had grown up into one of the handsomest men Steve had ever seen.

"Steve?" Bucky with incredulity, his hand on his daughter's shoulder.

"This is impossible!" Steve said, an honest-to-god wave of euphoria sweeping over his body. "How've you been?"

Bucky tried to step forward, but his daughter clung to his leg. Bucky swung the girl up into his arms to give her a kiss on the cheek. She had bright red hair (Steve didn't remember anyone in Bucky's family with red hair), and brilliant green eyes, completely adorable, or would have been had she not been glaring daggers at him.

"I've been good," Bucky said.

"Good." Steve swung Clint up onto his arm and hurried to where Bucky was standing over his spilled groceries. "Man, Bucky, it's good to see you again."

That wasn't what he really meant, but how could he possibly explain how much he'd missed Bucky? After Abraham had adopted him and taken him to live in New Jersey, Steve had missed Bucky so much that sometimes he couldn't sleep from the pain of it. He couldn't tell Abraham, couldn't make it seem like he was ungrateful to have been adopted.

He'd just missed Bucky _so much._

"Who's Bucky?" the little girl demanded, kicking her father in the hip.

"Bucky was my nickname when I was just a little kid," Bucky said to the girl.

She frowned. "You're not Bucky, you're Daddy."

A brilliant smile crossed Bucky's face, and Steve's knees gave another buckle. God, Bucky had grown up right. "I sure am," Bucky said. Glancing at Steve, he said, "Steve, this is Natasha."

"Hi, Natasha," Steve said, smiling at the girl. She buried her face in Bucky's shoulder, shyness overcoming her. "This is my son, Clint." Steve hefted Clint higher on his arm, turning so Clint's good ear was pointed at the new people. "Clint, this is my good friend Bucky Barnes."

Clint pushed his sunglasses up onto his forehead. "You shot my dad," he said to the little girl.

Natasha turned her head to peek at the boy. "I didn't mean to. It was an accident."

Bucky rolled his eyes as he set his daughter down. "What are you doing here?"

"We were on our way home from the city," Steve said, putting Clint on his feet to help James pick up his fallen groceries. "Clint and I spent the morning at the museum."

"We saw dinosaurs," Clint told Natasha.

Natasha put her hands on her hips. "Were they _real_ dinosaurs?" she demanded.

"They used to be." Clint lifted his arms high, to indicate the enormity of the dinosaurs. "They were so big!"

Smiling, Steve looked down to pick up Bucky's bread. At the same time, Bucky had reached out his left hand for the scattered milk cartons to put into the bag, only it wasn't a _hand_ at all. It took Steve a moment to realize what he was seeing, but when understanding hit, it as if Steve had been punched in the gut.

That was the hand of a Stark Industries prototype robotic arm, one of only four in the world outside of Tony Stark's R&D labs.

Steve, who spent more time with Tony Stark than nearly anyone, knew a lot about that particular model of prosthesis. He knew how hard Tony had been working to capture the robotic prosthetic market, how he had finally made inroads with the US military and won a contract to put together two prototypes, leg and arm, to be tested on four injured US veterans. Three of the test subjects were scattered across Texas and California; only one (male, left-arm amputee, no brain injury, Tony had rattled off one day) lived in New York state.

And like that, Steve knew more about what Bucky had been through in the last decade than he should, more than _he was legally allowed to know_.

What should he do? Tell Bucky? No, that would be a horrible idea, so soon after meeting up with Bucky again. He would keep his mouth shut and if Bucky wanted to tell him anything, he would listen, just like a good friend would..

While Steve had been staring at Bucky's hand and trying to come up with something to say, Bucky turned to him, a smile on his face. But Steve couldn't recover fast enough, and the smile vanished from Bucky's face. "Come on," Bucky said to Natasha, standing with his groceries in his arms. "We need to get home."

"Wait," Steve said, shooting to his feet. He was messing all this up; he couldn't lose Bucky again, not so _soon_. "Bucky, wait."

"What?" Bucky snapped, discomfort warring with annoyance on his features. It had been over twenty years and still Steve remembered so much about Bucky's expressions and mannerisms, this man who had once been his best friend.

"Just—it's good to see you again," Steve said lamely. "Maybe we could, you know, get together?"

Bucky caught his lip in his teeth as he looked down at Natasha. She was staring up at her father with a steady, unblinking gaze. "You could come over to our place, some day," Bucky said slowly.

Steve perked up. "How about tomorrow?" he asked. It was only after he spoke that he realized that might be an imposition. But he did not want to take it back.

"We go to the park on Sundays around two," Bucky said, glancing down at Natasha again. "How about you come over for lunch before that?"

"That sounds good," Steve said. His heart was soaring. "What do you think, Clint?"

Clint looked up at his dad. "Are there swings?" the boy demanded. It was his opening salvo in all play-date negotiations. Steve looked up Bucky.

"There sure are," Bucky said easily. "Do you like swings?"

"Uh huh," Clint said, nodding his enthusiasm.

"I like swings too," Natasha said, stepping closer to her father.

"I'll text you the address," Bucky said quickly. Steve, who had been an uncle and a father for long enough to know the warning signs of a tantrum, nodded. "Give me your number?"

Steve opened his mouth, but Clint, who was well-versed on his dad's contact information, quickly recited the number.

"Thanks, Clint," Bucky said. Clint grinned. "So yeah, Steve. Tomorrow."

Involuntarily, Steve smiled, his heart pounding in his chest. "I look forward to it." And then Bucky was walking away, holding his groceries in his left arm while guiding Natasha away with his right. Clint and Steve stared after them for a few minutes, then Clint looked up at his dad.

"Am I in trouble?" he asked.

Steve blinked. Right. The incident with the bow. "Yes, you are," Steve said. "I told you, you can't aim that thing at anyone."

"But the girl shot you first," Clint said sullenly, letting himself be pulled along the sidewalk.

"She was wrong to shoot me, but that doesn't mean that you can shoot her back." Steve wondered how he got into these situations. Whenever he asked Abraham that question, Abraham just laughed at him. "You're not going to be able to take the toy bow out with you any more when we go places."

"Aw, _man_!" Clint said. He kicked the sidewalk. "That sucks!"

Steve stopped abruptly. He pulled Clint over to the side, out of the flow of foot traffic. "That's not a nice word," he said, crouching down. "Where did you hear it?"

Clint crossed his arms and stared at the ground, his lower lip out in a pout.

"Was it Uncle Tony?"

"No." Clint looked up at his father. "It was Uncle Bruce."

Steve blinked. Bruce Banner was usually more careful to watch his language, and his temper, when around Clint. "Well, that's not a nice thing to say," Steve said. "When something happened that you don't like, what do we say?"

"Darn," Clint said sadly. "I gotta say darn."

"That's close enough." Steve ruffled Clint's hair. "Now, let's get home and I can start the mac and cheese, okay?"

Clint heaved a huge sigh. "Daddy, who was the girl?" he asked.

"That was Natasha, Bucky's daughter," Steve said, standing. He took Clint's hand in his. "We're going to go to their house tomorrow for lunch."

"I know that," Clint said. "I could _hear_ you."

Steve gave Clint's hand a squeeze. "I know you could, buddy. I was just making sure."

"Can I bring my bow to show her?" Clint asked hopefully. "My real bow?"

"You know that the only place we take your bow is to archery class," Steve said. They turned the corner on the way to the subway station. "How about you take your new bird book? You can show Natasha all the cool birds."

"Yeah!" Clint said, suddenly energized. He punched the air with his free hand. "I'll show her my birds! Birds are so neat! Almost as neat as dinosaurs!"

Smiling, Steve picked up Clint and tossed him over his shoulder. Clint giggled as they walked down the street, cheerful again even after the loss of his toy bow. Nothing could get Clint down for long.

Steve, meanwhile, was over the moon. Separated for twenty years, and he ran into Bucky spontaneously at the grocery store. He'd never have thought he'd see Bucky again, but here he was, relatively healthy and looking really, really good. He had a beautiful daughter, and possibly a wife or someone waiting for him at home. Maybe, in spite of all he'd been through in the military, Bucky was happy.

Steve sighed. He hoped the kids got along, because he wanted the next day to be one of many days he would see Bucky again.

He wanted to be friends with Bucky again. He'd missed Bucky far too much over the years to want to let the man go so quickly.


	7. The One With Carters and Rogers and Barnes, Oh My

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Takes places the morning after [Chapter 18 of Hands of Clay](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2143266/chapters/9690588). Steve POV.
> 
> The second half of this outtake largely inspired by [an anon commenter on Tumblr](http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/118750112067/anon-b-c-this-relates-to-my-brother-who-is) who wanted to let me know that [Ranger Panties](https://www.google.ca/search?q=ranger+panties&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=pmtRVfOgO9G6ogSb2YGICQ&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1231&bih=1148) _(google image search results, nothing too NSFW)_ are a Thing.

* * *

The ringing of the phone dragged Steve out of a deep sleep. He groped for his phone, eyelids heavy as he tried to wake up. Only one person called him at random hours, and Steve promised himself that one day, he was going to stop picking up Tony Stark's random ass-end-of-night calls. One day.

His hand finally made contact with his phone. Glancing at the screen, instead of seeing Tony's face as he expected, he saw an unfamiliar number with a Washington State area code, and that pulled him all the way to consciousness with screaming clarity. Was it one of his sisters? Had something happened to the kids?

Heart pounding, Steve swiped and put the phone to his ear. "Hello?" he demanded.

"Hey."

At the sound of the familiar voice, most of the nervous tension left Steve's body. "Sharon, what the hell?" he said, trying to kick his way free of the sheet. "It's fucking early."

"How's Clint?" Sharon asked.

It took Steve a moment to wonder at her voice, scratchy and rough. They'd spent enough time living together for Steve to wonder if Sharon had the flu. "He's fine," Steve replied. Finally getting free, he swung his legs around to put his feet on the floor. "Still sleeping. We had a late night last night."

"How was his birthday?"

"Fine." Steve rubbed his hand over his face. "He got some cool presents. He liked his birthday cake." Then, when there was no sound from the other end of the line, Steve went on, "I took some pictures for Abraham, and a video, I can send you the link."

"You're not in Jersey?"

"No, Abraham's at a conference," Steve said. He wandered over to the bedroom's window, looking out onto the pink-and-purple sunrise sky. "We're at Tony's beach house. With Bucky and his daughter."

Steve wasn't entirely sure why he'd added that last; surely Sharon wouldn't care who else was there. Half the time he was pretty sure she didn't care too much about _him_ ; Clint was what they really had in common, even after those three years of living in the same apartment.

"Is Clint having fun?"

"Yeah." Steve turned away from the window, crossing the room to the bedroom door. "He's swimming and practicing on his new bow. We're going on a hike this morning, I think he'll like that."

Steve opened his door onto a silent and empty landing. The sofa where Bucky slept was empty, the sheet folded neatly under the pillow. A slip of paper lay on the couch, with _Steve_ written in block letters on the front. On the other side of the loft, the children's bedroom door was open with no sound from within.

"Does he like to hike?" Sharon asked, her voice sounding somewhat shaky, but Steve couldn't tell if that was from the connection or not.

"He likes to run around," Steve said, walking across the landing to the children's room. Inside, Clint and Natasha were fast asleep. Natasha had curled up around her bear in the night, her red hair a tangled mess on her pillow. Clint, meanwhile, lay on his back, arms and legs outstretched like a starfish. Floppy hung precariously off the side of the bed. "Anything where he can pretend to be a dinosaur, he likes."

"Dinosaurs," Sharon repeated. "Has he seen Jurassic Park yet?"

"Not yet," Steve said quietly, closing the children's door behind him as he backed out onto the landing. "We talked about it, but the kids are a bit too young still."

A long pause from Sharon. Just as Steve was about to ask if she'd been cut off, she said, "Your friend is in Clint's life a lot."

"Yes, he is," Steve replied evenly. He took four long steps to the couch, grabbed Bucky's note, and headed for the stairs. He braced himself for Sharon to ask what Bucky was to Steve, what place he had in Steve's life. What the hell would he even say? He had no idea what Bucky wanted, what they really were to each other.

But Sharon just gave a dry cough and said. "I requested a transfer back to New York."

Steve nearly missed the last step. His foot came down with a thud and he stumbled, but caught his balance quickly. Steve had grown so used to being Clint's father, every day of their lives, that he hadn't even imagined what might happen if Sharon came back to the States. His heart in his throat, Steve had to swallow before he could speak. "What does that mean?"

"It means I'll be traveling out of New York for work, instead of London."

"No, what does that _mean_?"

"About Clint?" Sharon coughed again, this time a more drawn-out, hacking cough. When she stopped coughing, she cleared her throat a few times, then said, "I want to see him, sometimes."

His heart was pounding, his knees weak. Sharon was Clint's mother, and Steve knew how important it was that she was part of his life. But the idea of Steve not being there to tuck Clint in every night made him feel cold. "Do you want to revisit the custody agreement?" Steve demanded.

"No," Sharon said, so quick and sharp that Steve blinked in surprise. "No, with everything… it's best that we leave things like they are."

 _Like they are_ was Steve with full custody, an agreement that even Steve's lawyer had tried to talk Sharon out of, but she had been adamant. If she came back to New York now, Steve had every legal right to keep Sharon completely out of Clint's life.

But he would never do that. He'd lost his own mother when he was five, and he still missed her every single day. Steve would never keep Clint from his own mother.

He sat down heavily on the sofa by the fireplace. "But you still want to see him?"

"Of course I do, he's my baby," Sharon said heatedly. The enthusiasm of her reply set her coughing again.

"Are you okay?" Steve asked, starting to be worried about her. She had always been so healthy, never smoked or anything, but that cough sounded bad.

"Yeah," she rasped. "I was out in the back woods on a land deal, I caught too much smoke from the campfire, that's all." She cleared her throat. "Maybe I could see Clint for an afternoon or two? Maybe have him overnight?"

"Yeah, maybe," Steve said. He clenched his fist holding Bucky's note, the paper crumpling sharp against his palm. "We'll talk about it when you're back."

"Good." Sharon let out a ragged sigh. "I miss him so much."

Steve didn't point out that Sharon had made the choice to go overseas for work; it would have been childish and petty and it had been her choice, and he knew how much it had hurt her to make it years before. "He misses you."

"Does he hate me for not being there for his birthday?"

"Not exactly."

"Steve."

"He got worked up after you dropped in on him, that afternoon," Steve said. "Bucky told him that it was okay to be angry at the people you love, as long as you remember that you love them first."

"He sounds like a smart man," Sharon said, and there was that old familiar ring in her voice that Steve had never been able to interpret. "Is he good for Clint?"

"He is," Steve said with feeling. "He really is." Steve waited for the question, what Bucky was to Steve, and not knowing how he could answer.

But again, Sharon moved on. "I'll call you when I get back to the city," she said. "I need to figure out where I'm going to stay, get my stuff out of storage, all that."

"Okay." Steve set the crumpled note, still unopened, on the table. "You know, I think until you know you're going to be around, I'm not going to tell Clint. I don't want him to get his hopes up if you're not going to be back for a while."

A pause on the line, then Sharon said, in a tight voice, "I suppose that's best."

Steve bit back the quick retort, that she hadn't had to handle the fallout of a devastated Clint after his mother had dropped into his life for the briefest possible visit the month before. "Once you know what your timeline looks like, give me a call and we'll sort it out," he said.

"I will."

Steve rubbed his forehead. He would not get into things with Sharon, not now. "Is there anything else?"

"No," Sharon said. "I should go. And send me those pictures."

"Okay."

"Well. Bye, Steve." The line went dead.

Steve pulled his phone back to glare at the screen. She hadn't even given him the time to ask him why on earth she was in Washington State, when she was supposed to be in London or in Europe.

"Fuck," Steve said under his breath, dropping his phone onto the couch. He hadn't thought what might happen when Sharon came back to New York, what it would mean for him and for Clint and the life they had built without her.

He needed to find Bucky. Bucky would know what to do, what to say, would have some calm way to approach the chaos that threatened to upset Steve's life. Bucky always knew what to do.

Steve picked up the note and smoothed it out over his knee. Inside, in blue crayon, was a message from Bucky.

_Hey I went for a run on the beach. Back soon. omlets for breakfast? we gotta use all those eggs. also sandwiches for the hike. you think we'll be gone that long? I put some juice boxes in the freezer to chill._

The note was signed with a loopy J. Steve ran his thumb over the initial, smearing a loose grain of the blue wax. Bucky was out on the beach. With the children still sleeping, Steve could go down and find him and talk everything over without the danger of the children overhearing him. There, that was a good plan.

Steve glanced at himself. He had slept in a t-shirt and boxers that were nearly as long as his swim trunks; there was no problem with him going out in this outfit.

With his mission in mind, Steve stood, walked over to the door, went outside, and had taken a dozen steps toward the beach when the sight that met his eyes made him go completely still.

Bucky was running barefoot on the beach, shirtless and wearing a pair of shorts that were nearly short enough to be indecent. In the early morning light, his skin glowed as he ran away from Steve. The fabric of the shorts clung wetly to his body, the rising sun outlining the curve of his ass, the length of his muscular thighs.

Mouth dry, Steve backed up a few paces, putting one of the trees between himself and Bucky. He wasn't sure why he was hiding, but he'd so seldom had a chance to just look at Bucky when Bucky wasn't being self-conscious.

Here, now, Bucky ran with an ease and grace that Steve hadn't ever seen in him. He was long and lean, muscular shoulders and chest tapering to a slim waist. His left arm moved as easily as his right, with no one there to see him, and even the truncated limb seemed to fit in this light, not solely a reminder of violence, but a part of the man Bucky had become. He ran with a bounce in his step all the way along the beach, just above the surf.

Then he turned into the water, went in up to his knees, and started running back through the water. His head was down as he ran, hardly letting the drag of the water slowing him down at all. It was hard work, but Bucky didn't let up, instead sprinting back up the entire line of the beach in the water. As he drew near the rocky outcropping, he veered up onto the sand, breathing hard. Without stopping to catch his breath, he ran back down the sand for another go.

Steve could only stand behind the tree and stare. He'd seen Bucky without his shirt on at the house, and at the swimming pool, but Bucky had been so self-conscious those times that Steve had pretended that he wasn't looking. But now, watching the sun play off the wet lines of Bucky's perfect body, showing the strength and grace in the man… something curled low and hot in Steve's belly, desire and apprehension and something else, something that was almost _need_.

Steve waited until Bucky turned to run back down the sand, then went back into the house. He leaned against the counter until his physical reaction had subsided, then he made a pot of coffee to give his churning emotions time to settle down.

Bucky was his friend, his _best_ friend. That was the most important thing to Steve, and he would do everything he could to keep his friendship with Bucky strong and secure. But damn, Bucky was fucking _hot_ under those clothes.

When the coffee finished dripping into the pot, Steve poured out two mugs, took a deep breath, and went outside to find his best friend.

Bucky was out in the ocean now, swimming in the shallows. Steve made his way down the sand until the surf was curling around his ankles before he yelled, "Up for coffee?"

Bucky turned around, treading water. He grinned when he saw Steve, his face open and happy and Steve couldn't help but to smile in return. "Be right in!" Bucky shouted before diving under the water. Steve stepped back up the beach, heading to a rock where he could sit, and waited for Bucky to join him.

Bucky popped up out of the water like a merman, already in a jog-trot before he was fully out of the water. The small shorts clung to his body in a way that left Steve in no doubt as to Bucky's religion. Water streaming off his lean body, Bucky ran up the beach and dropped onto the rock at Steve's side. Picking up the mug, he breathed in the fragrant steam. "This is some good shit," he said, taking a sip. "Whoever taught you to make coffee, I should buy them a goddamn fruit basket."

Steve watched Bucky's pink, wet lips press against the mug, and felt a little faint. "It was, uh, Thor," he said. Bucky raised his eyebrows. "Thor, I met him when I was in college. He'd spent some time in Italy when he was in high school, and he always went around boasting that he could make a cup of coffee that would put hair on the chest of a nun."

Bucky took another slurp. "A cup of coffee like this, is one hell of a miracle." He smiled at Steve. "The kids up?"

"No." Steve looked down at his own mug, and was reminded of why he had come out to seek Bucky's company in the first place. "Sharon called. She's coming back to New York."

He heard Bucky's sharp intake of breath, then Bucky's hand was resting on Steve's arm. "Does she want to take Clint?" Bucky demanded.

"No." Steve looked up. Bucky's eyes were sharp and concerned. "I asked her if she wanted to change the custody agreement, and she was pretty certain that she didn't. But she will want to see him, a bit."

Bucky squeezed Steve's wrist. "When will she be back?"

"I dunno, but soon I guess." He set his mug onto the rock. "I'm not going to tell Clint until I'm sure, you know?"

"Yeah, good idea," Bucky said immediately. He withdrew his hand, picking up the coffee mug once more. "Anything you need, I'm there."

"I know," Steve said in an unguarded moment. He looked at Bucky, still dripping from his swim in the ocean. "I know. It means a lot."

"Are _you_ okay?" Bucky asked, frowning slightly. "You think you that you and her… I mean… Do you want another chance with Sharon?"

"No," Steve said immediately. "We're done. We've been through for a long time."

Something in Bucky's face eased. "That would make things easier," he said. "I mean, that you know that."

"Yeah." Steve took a long sip of coffee. "Anyway, forget about Sharon for now. We still on for our hike?"

"You bet your ass we are." Bucky flashed Steve a brilliant grin. "The kids will love it."

"And if they don't?" Steve asked.

"Then we haul them along like a sack of potatoes back to the car," Bucky said with a shrug. "They'll be fine. They always like new places." He stood. This put his hips mere inches from Steve's face, and Steve was physically unable to look away from Bucky's shapely ass. Thankfully, Bucky was looking in the other direction and was thus oblivious to Steve's lechery.

"Yeah," Steve said inanely. "So, uh, breakfast?"

"You bet," Bucky said. He drained the last of his coffee. "Hey, when do you think we can go get the laundry from the big house? This is my last pair of clean shorts, and there's no fucking way I'm going into the woods in these."

"Why not?" Steve asked, then blushed.

"Bugs," Bucky said, and used his left arm stump to hit Steve on the shoulder. "I learned that lesson in Ranger school."

"Oh?" Something clicked in Steve's brain. "Are those from your army days?"

Bucky shrugged as he turned back to the house. "Yeah, it's part of the kit for training. Keeps things well-ventilated in the Georgia heat. Come on, if the kids wake up and we're not there, there's no telling what they'll get up to."

"Sure," Steve said, lingering to take one last sip from his mug. This put Bucky in front of him on the walk back up to the house, and Steve was doubly grateful that Bucky wasn't able to see Steve staring at the curve of his back, his butt, his thighs.

Steve sent a thankful prayer to whoever designed the army's training shorts, and followed Bucky to the house.

(The children had woken up in the adults' absence. Clint had dragged his bow case out from under Steve's bed and was singing a song to the bow, while Natasha jumped up and down on Steve's bed, yelling at the top of her lungs.

All in all, a good start to the day.)


	8. The One Where Natasha Comes Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The one where James brings Natasha home from the hospital for the first time (set in September, 2009, before the series starts)

* * *

**_September, 2009_ **

James placed the car seat down gently on the top step of the brownstone entrance. The car seat's tiny inhabitant looked up at him expectantly. "This is it," James said, feeling slightly foolish, and a whole lot out of his depth. "This is home."

Natasha wriggled, shoving her fist into her mouth and losing interest in the entire proceedings. That was fair, James thought as he dug the house keys out of his pocket. She was only six months old.

The street in Brooklyn Heights was bustling around them, at three o'clock in the afternoon. Cars, cyclists, pedestrians all moving in the traditional dance of Brooklyn, only it all felt rehearsed to James, an overly fake performance. But he and his psychiatrist had talked about this, that it was a by-product of spending eight years in the army, of the trauma of the explosion and of losing his arm. After four months back in the States, James knew that once he got inside and locked the door, the noise in his head would settle down.

James jangled the keys, catching the baby's attention. Natasha grinned up at him gummily. "You want to go check the place out?" James asked as he put the key into the lock. His heartbeat quickened in anticipation, even though he knew that the baby wouldn't have any reaction to the place. But since he took possession of the house two weeks previously, he had spent every waking minute making sure that the house would be ready for when he brought the baby home from the hospital.

And here they were.

The key turned easily in the tumblers, and James pushed open the outer door. "Gotta go through the airlock," he said as he picked up the car seat and brought Natasha inside. "Not too bad so far, right?"

Natasha yawned.

James closed the outer door, locked it carefully, then unlocked the inner door. Five months since he'd lost his arm, and he still kept forgetting that he was down a limb. Everything took longer, was clumsier, and sometimes James wanted to scream.

But he couldn't scream today. Today, and every other day to come, he had a baby to care for.

Instead, he took a deep breath. "Okay, Natasha, here it is," he said as he picked up the car seat once more. He picked it up and carried it into the house.

The brownstone was big and echoing. The previous owners hadn't bothered with any upgrades when selling, just took their furniture and left. But the place was clean and solidly built, and when the winter came, the walls would be strong enough to keep the heat in and the snow out. More than enough for a man who had spent an entire Afghanistan winter in a tent.

James carried Natasha's car seat into the living room and placed her carefully on the new coffee table. The furniture had been delivered and assembled the previous day, at a cost that still made James cringe. But he couldn't bring a baby home to a completely empty house, so he'd paid the money and would figure things out later.

Easing himself onto the sofa, James said, " So here we are."

Natasha scrunched up her nose and waved her left arm, grasping at the air with her tiny baby fingers.

"Are you hungry?" James asked, abandoning his plan of showing the baby over the house. "I've got formula from the hospital."

James went over to the bag he'd brought home from the hospital the previous day. It contained a few diapers, the kind of bottles that Natasha had been using over the last month, and a few easy-to-open cans of formula.

"Gotta keep to your routine," he said, as he hauled the bag back to the table. "That's what the nurse said. Keep to the routine."

James opened a can of formula, then poured the liquid into one of the bottles.

"This sure ain't the easiest thing in the world to do," he said. Natasha turned her head to look at him. "Guess when you got two hands, everything's a little easier, huh?"

He put the bottle between his knees, then put the bottle top in place and screwed it on tight. He gave the bottle an experimental shake.

"Here we go," he said, turning the bottle over and aiming the rubber nipple in Natasha's direction. She reached out for the bottle, her tiny hands grasping at the plastic as she started sucking.

Some piece of nervous tension in James' chest eased. Natasha was eating. Even though he'd fed her in the hospital every day when he'd visited, this was different. There were no nurses around to intervene if Natasha fussed, no one to watch over his shoulder to make sure he was doing things 'right'. It was just him and the baby now, and the baby was doing all right.

James realized belatedly that he was grinning. He gave his head a shake. "Look at me," he said. "I'm a mess, huh?"

Natasha ignored him, focusing with single-minded intensity on her bottle.

"The docs said that you're nearly all better," James went on, adjusting his grip on the bottle. "I gotta give you your medicine every day, and we gotta see the docs once a week for a bit, but you're going to be okay. What do you think?"

Natasha shifted her gaze from the bottle to James' face. He smiled at her, and his heart soared when she smiled back, milk dribbling over her chin as she released the bottle.

"Now look who's making a mess," James said. He set the bottle down to reach for one of the small cloths in the bag. "It's you. Yes, it's you."

Natasha gave a toothless grin as James wiped her face, then chomped down on the cloth. James had to tug it out of her mouth before getting the bottle back in place.

"Are you teething?" James asked, angling the bottle so Natasha could drink with ease. "It's about time, you're six months old now. Even if you're small, those teeth are coming."

After James had submitted his application to adopt Natasha, Nick Fury had moved with alacrity, pushing at James all the paper work he needed to fill out, all the people he needed to meet, all the classes he had to take. In addition, James had read every book he could find about babies and how they grew up, and what was normal, and had taken his other questions to the nurses and doctors at the paediatric ward where Natasha had been moved after coming out of ICU. His head was full of details about how babies grew, and one thing that was at the top of every book on six-month-old babies was that they were either in the process of teething, or close to it.

"I bet you're going to have some chompers," James said. By now, the bottle was two-thirds empty, and Natasha was beginning to lose interest in her lunch. "I got you a teething ring, how does that sound? Do you want a teething ring?"

Natasha pushed the bottle away, so James set it down and aside. He wiped her chin again with the cloth, then unbuckled Natasha from the car seat. Taking a moment to toss another cloth over his left shoulder, James eased his right hand under Natasha's little body. He'd practiced this move in the hospital and hadn't dropped the baby yet.

Instead of lifting the baby up to his shoulder like he'd have done before the accident, James had to lower his torso that Natasha was gently sandwiched against his chest, her chin resting on his left shoulder. Then he carefully sat back, bringing the baby with him. Her chin on his shoulder and her body held in place by James' right arm, and there he was, holding her.

"We did it," James said quietly, as Natasha grasped at the receiving blanket with tiny fingers. "Now, are you going to burp?"

He sat on the couch, angling himself so any projectile vomit wouldn't land on the upholstery. Natasha wasn't prone to puking after eating much anymore, but James had lost enough good laundry to baby vomit already that he wasn't taking any chances with the couch.

"Naahgannagnah," Natasha said, squirming.

"I know." James patted her back gently. "It's hard work, being a baby."

In response to this observation, Natasha let out an enormous belch. At the same time, a strong odor began to fill the air.

"All right, someone needs changing," James said with a sigh. "Although I'm not supposed to lay you down right after you eat."

Natasha burped again.

"If you insist."

Part of the previous day's delivery had been the furniture for Natasha's room, but James had run into a snag with the painting; James wanted to strip the upstairs floors' walls down to the wood before he repainted; lord knew how much lead paint there was in a house this old. His old pal Fred, who now ran his family's painting business out of Queens, had been able to give James a very good rate on the job, but didn't have an opening until the following month. James had spent an entire afternoon of gruelling physio weighing the options of going with another company, but in the end, he'd gone with Fred. He may have spent almost a decade in the Army, but he'd grown up living and breathing the construction industry in the Five Boroughs, and when you had a buddy who did good work, well, you waited for him to be able to do your job. That was how it went.

James may have left construction behind when he went off to basic training, but he'd never be able to dig that part of his childhood out of his bones.

So for the next few weeks, James was going to have to make things work while the upstairs in limbo. He had put the baby's furniture in the room he hoped to use for his office, and he was going to sleep on the couch until the upstairs was ready. Easy as pie.

Of course, the decision had seemed a good one when Natasha was still in the hospital; now, with her diaper stinking up the living room, James was wondering once more if he was in over his head.

James let out a breath to steady himself, a habit long ingrained in his years behind the sniper's scope. "One step at a time," he said to Natasha. "First, you need a change."

"Mwagah," Natasha agreed.

James set Natasha down on the couch, praying that there were no diaper blow-outs on the new couch. He pulled the changing pad out of the bag, laid it on the ground, then transferred the baby to the changing pad. Natasha grabbed for James' hand as he unsnapped her onesie. "You are a tiny baby," he informed her as he peeled back the fabric. "But you are a stinky baby too. So stinky."

Natasha farted.

"That is exactly what I mean." James opened the diaper's tabs. "You're almost as bad as the guys in basic. Now those were some men with intestinal distress."

Pulling the diaper open, James was relieved to see that things were about normal. Funnily enough, dealing one-handed with baby poo hadn't even crossed James' mind as an obstacle. Shit, he could deal with.

Natasha wriggled as James went through the process of a diaper change, but she didn't try to roll away or sit up. This made the diaper change go smoothly, and soon James was snapping Natasha back into her onesie.

"I'm going to go wash up, will you stay here?" James asked.

Natasha kicked her feet.

Moving quickly, James carried the dirty diaper bundle into the kitchen and stuffed it into the trash bin. He would deal with it when Natasha was napping. He had stocked the kitchen with soap and a dishcloth the day before, along with formula for the baby and a freezer full of TV dinners for himself. He had a few jars of puréed baby food in the back of the cupboard for when Natasha was ready to start on solid foods. Just in case.

James quickly soaped, washed, and dried his hand, cursing at how difficult such a simple thing could be. The doctors all said he'd get used to it, but even after all these months it still rankled him.

As he put the dishcloth on the counter, a soft _thump_ sounded from the living room. Heart suddenly in his throat, James raced into the living room, terrified that something had happened to Natasha, even though he'd only left her for a moment, how could he have been so stupid? But all he found was Natasha, lying on her stomach and looking around herself in bewilderment.

"Jesus Christ," he muttered, going down on his knees. He patted Natasha all over, head and back and feet, to reassure himself that she had come to no harm. "When did you start rolling over like that?"

Natasha stuck her fist in her mouth.

"Okay." James lay down on the floor beside Natasha. "We need to get some things straight, kid. I might be the daddy, but you gotta pull your own weight around here."

It took him a moment to realize it, but that had been the first time he'd called himself a _daddy_.

"Jesus," he said again. "What the hell am I doing, Nat?"

Natasha reached out with her slobbery fist to bop James on the nose.

"That's right, you gotta keep me in line." James caught Natasha's hand in his fingers. Even though she had grown so much he'd first met her three months before in the hospital, she was so _tiny_. Being so sick in such a vital period of development had hindered her growth, physically, but the doctors had said that she would start to make up for that in the coming months.

"But you're still the smartest baby in the whole hospital," James said, giving Natasha's tiny hand a shake. "How many of those babies can listen to a story so well, huh?"

"Bluh," Natasha agreed. She blinked green eyes at him as she let her head rest on the blanket.

"I bet you'll be the smartest baby in your whole class," James said. He sat up, his back aching slightly. "Do all those smart things. Like read, and count, shit like that."

He helped Natasha roll onto her back, then carefully picked her up.

"Although after your exciting afternoon, you should have a nap," James said. Natasha was so light on his arm, so fragile. "You had your very first car ride, and you got to see the new house. Do you think you'll like living here?"

Natasha was non-committal as James carried her into the office. Her crib had been set up against the wall, the bed made with happy elephant sheets. One side of the crib was down, so James could put Natasha down without the risk of dropping her. He set her on the crib's firm mattress, and patted her tummy before he latched the crib's side in place.

"Now, do you think you'll be able to nap?" James asked, stepping back.

Natasha looked up at him dubiously.

"Right." James went back to the living room to retrieve the blanket that had come with them from the hospital. On his way back to the office, he paused beside a small gift bag. He stared at it for a while, before being recalled to himself by Natasha's fussing. He was being stupid, he told himself as he picked up the gift bag. Natasha was just a baby, she wouldn't think he was being sentimental.

Back in the office, Natasha was kicking her feet and making unhappy noises. She seldom cried while in the hospital and James was determined to not make her feel like she needed to cry now that she was at home with him.

"Hey, Natasha," James said, dropping the gift bag by the side of the crib. "Sorry I was gone so long."

He draped the blanket over her, tucking it loosely around her feet. Natasha grabbed the blanket's edge and brought it up to her face. She calmed instantly.

"I read a thing about babies and smell," James said. He pulled over a rickety folding chair, one of the only things he'd brought with him from the old apartment. "Familiar smells make you feel safe. How does that sound?"

"Abawah."

"Yeah." James reached over the crib's side, putting his hand flat on Natasha's tummy. Her breathing was even and steady. "Thing may be different from the hospital, but I'm going to do everything I can to make you feel safe."

Natasha yawned.

"I just…" James trailed off, feeling a lump rising in his throat. It had taken him a long time to feel safe again after the explosion Iraq that had torn off his arm and ended his military career.

He'd found safety in the military, ironically, but before that, living in Brooklyn and all the things that had happened… he hadn't felt really safe at home since his childhood best friend, Steve Rogers, moved away to New Jersey when they were twelve.

James cleared his throat. "I'm going to do everything to keep you safe," he said to Natasha. "I know what it's like to think your folks don't want you because of who you are, so I ain't ever going to do that with you."

He withdrew his hand from the crib, and reached down to pull the stuffed bear out of the gift bag. He'd bought the thing a month before, on the day Nick had called him to confirm that James was cleared to take Natasha home when she was released from the hospital.

"This is for you," he said, putting the teddy bear into the crib beside Natasha. She grabbed at it, hauling it close to her face. James held it up so she could examine it. The bear, with its little red-and-blue outfit and its black eye mask, appeared to meet Natasha's approval, for she squeezed its paw with one hand. "So you'll know that I'm there to keep you safe, even when I'm not around."

Natasha yawned again, and gave a little wriggle to get comfortable. Still clutching the bear's paw, she closed her eyes.

"It's you and me, kid." James sat watching Natasha sleep for a little while, then quietly tiptoed out of the office.

Back in the living room, James wandered over to the couch. He spent a few minutes getting things in order, putting the car seat by the door, putting away the supplies in the bag. Then he sat on the couch and considered.

Even though his share of his mother's estate had been sizable, he had spent most of it on buying the brownstone. He had enough left over for furniture and the renovations on the second and third floors, as well as a car of some kind. His army disability pension wasn't enough for two people to live on in New York, and certainly not for this neighbourhood's property taxes. He was going to have to get a job, somehow, one that would let him watch Natasha and take her to all her doctors' appointments over the next few months.

If he wasn't missing an arm, James would have gone back into construction. He knew the business, still had connections around town. His mother had sold her share in the family business after James' father had died, but James was sure there were still folks in Brooklyn who would do business with a Barnes. The family name still meant something, in the industry.

James rubbed his hand over his face. He was twenty-seven now, with a daughter to provide for. He had to get his shit together. Other than Nick Fury, Natasha had no one else in the world who cared for her. And Nick fully expected James to cowboy up, otherwise he'd never have introduced James to Natasha.

James had to provide a certain level of financial security for Natasha, and soon. He might have been overly hasty in buying the brownstone, but it was a great building, with solid post-Civil-War construction. The plumbing and electrical had been modernized in the last hundred years, and with a few more renovations, the place would be absolutely perfect for a little girl to grow up in.

As long as James could pull his shit together.

James sighed, pushing himself to his feet. He wandered into the kitchen, thinking he'd get some water, but the sight of the back door that led out onto the overgrown garden reminded him that he had been meaning to get the lock reinforced. James didn't have any valuables to steal, but now that he had a baby in the house, he wanted to make the place as secure as possible.

Going over to the door, James swung it open to examine the lock again. As he did so, a small idea started to gel in his mind, something coming together from a thousand little moments in his life.

James had, as his father said, grown up with sawdust in his veins. He'd spent eight years in the Army and the Rangers, and he had come to know a great deal about security over the years. It wouldn't be too hard to put that together into a job back home, right?

James thought about it. If he were to specialize in one area of construction, home security, he wouldn't step on any toes of his old contacts; rather, he could help them out. If they didn't have to deal with some fancy city contractor, they'd be happier. Some of the guys in the industry in Brooklyn and Queens, James had grown up on their construction sites, and to them the Barnes name still meant something. He'd had a solid career as a Ranger, and the medals to prove his exemplary service, which counted for a lot in New York after 9/11.

And if he billed as a consultant, he'd be able to work from home and keep an eye on Natasha.

James ran his thumb over the old deadbolt. He wasn't sure how great of an idea this was, but he wasn't finding a whole lot more options. He had gone into the Army right after high school, and going to college now wasn't an option, not with the baby.

And having a good career was vital for James to be able to complete the adoption. During the first home visits, while Natasha was still in the hospital, he'd been able to point to his inheritance and his veterans' benefits, but now with the inheritance sunk into the house, James had to get his shit in order before the next social worker thought to question his financial suitability.

Giving the deadbolt one last tap, James closed the door. He had a plan now, and a lot of phone calls to make. Even though he had just brought Natasha home from the hospital that afternoon, he'd been getting to know her for a few months now, and he'd promised her that he was going to keep her safe and provide for her. She didn't know what those words meant, quite yet, but James was a man of his word.

He was going to do everything in his power to keep Natasha safe, and help her grow up happy and stable and loved. He'd see the renovations through to ensure the house was safe, and he'd build up his own business to keep them both financially secure.

A noise from elsewhere in the house made James shake off his musing. In the office, Natasha hadn't woken up fully, but she was making nonsense sounds. James tugged the blanket back in place over her tummy, then smoothed her fine red hair over her head. She settled back into sleep.

"I'm going to make you a promise," James said quietly. "You're always going to be my first priority. Not the job, not the car, not sports or any shit like that. It's going to be you and me, Natasha."

Natasha smiled in her sleep, although that may have been gas. James tiptoed out of the room. His kid was fed, clean and sleeping, and James might actually be able to pull this off after all.

He squared his shoulders. Now, he had phone calls to make, and a business to start. Then, when Natasha woke up, they would read a book, and work on her sitting up and rolling over, and James couldn't think of anything else he'd rather do.


	9. The One With the Battle of the Stroller

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> set in 2010.

* * *

What James would later dub the Battle of the Stroller began on one lovely June morning at the park. Natasha, sixteen months old now and already _running_ , was doing her little bouncing dash while James pretended to chase her. The park was full of children and adults, but Natasha paid them no mind as she toddled to and fro, enjoying herself thoroughly.

James, on the other hand, was keeping an eye on the time. He had a phone call scheduled with a client for eleven, which meant he had to get Natasha home by ten-fifteen and down for her morning nap. After a few more laps, he pretended to collapse in exhaustion.

"Natasha, you win," he called.

Natasha wandered over to him, frowning a little at his dramatic display. "Daddy," she said, and poked at him. "Daddy!"

"Daddy is tired," James told her. "I think we both need to go home and have a nap, what do you say?"

Natasha put her finger in her mouth as she looked around, losing interest in her father's antics. "Ogg!" she shouted, pointing at a leashed husky across the playground.

"Yup, that's a dog," James said. He hauled himself to his feet, dusted off his backside as best he could with one hand, and held out his prosthetic claw to Natasha. "Come on, sweet pea, time to go home."

Natasha took the offered claw and toddled with James over to their stroller. Walking nearby was a woman with three children, one in the stroller itself and the other two holding onto the stroller as they walked alongside. Natasha appeared fascinated, staring after them as James moved back the stroller seat's straps and put Natasha's baggie of cheerios under the seat.

"Okay, Nat, in you go."

"No."

"Natasha, come on." James held out his hand to help Natasha crawl into the stroller. "Time to go home. We can have a snack."

" 'nack."

James grinned. Natasha was growing up so fast, she seemed to have a new word every week. "Yes, a snack. But you need to get into the stroller first so we can go home."

The corners of Natasha's mouth turned down. "No!"

"Natasha, come _on_."

When it became apparent that Natasha had no interest in getting into her stroller, James took a deep breath to brace himself, then reached down to lift Natasha around the middle, his prosthetic arm keeping the girl from overbalancing. He managed to get her into the stroller seat, but the moment he let go of her, Natasha glared up at him, opened her mouth, and let out an ungodly scream.

"Jesus, what?" James exclaimed, diving to pick Natasha up. Had something pinched her? He'd seen wasps around, had she been bitten by a wasp?

As soon as Natasha was free of the stroller, she stopped screaming. Smacking her lips unconcernedly, she looked around the playground from her perch on James' arm. She didn't appear to be in any discomfort.

James took a breath as the adrenaline spike faded. Natasha wasn't hurt. "Don't do that, kiddo, you'll give your old man a heart attack," he said as he pressed a kiss against her cheek. Natasha grinned at him, showing all her baby teeth. "Do you want to get back in your stroller now?"

"No!"

"What, you gonna walk home then?" James set Natasha on the ground. She toddled over to the stroller, put her hand on the side, and looked up at him expectantly.

"You're a handful and a half, you know that?" James said. Shaking his head, he went around to take hold of the stroller's push-bar. "Come on, kiddo, let's go."

He thought that Natasha would tire soon and he could put her in the stroller at that point, but little Natasha walked the entire way home, all eight blocks. It took a long time, especially as Natasha kept stopping to crouch down to look at things, but finally, James was hauling the stroller up the front steps of the brownstone behind Natasha.

The only up side to this was that Natasha fell asleep almost as soon as James tucked her into her big-girl bed. He was late and rushed for his phone call, and by the time Natasha woke up, he was slumped over in his office chair, exhausted.

"Daddy," came Natasha's voice from the second floor. "Daddy, 'nack?"

James lifted his head, then gently bumped his forehead against the desk. Parenting with only one arm was so _hard_ some days. Then he pushed himself to his feet. He could feel sorry for himself all he wanted, but it wouldn't get the baby's diaper changed.

* * *

The second stage of the battle came the following day. They were running low on milk, so James decided to pack Natasha into her stroller for a quick dash down to the grocery store, ten easy blocks. They'd done the trip many times before, so James wasn't expecting any trouble.

But trouble was what he got.

Natasha, dressed all neat in her stripped leggings, cotton dress and light jacket, took one look at the stroller and collapsed into a screaming fit on the floor.

"Oh my god, what?" James shouted over the din. "Why are you doing this?"

Natasha, did not respond, only kicked and screamed until she was red in the face. Fearing she would work herself up into an asthma attack, James hauled her up, tossed her over his shoulder, and carried her into the kitchen. She calmed almost instantly, her breath coming a little fast as she clutched at James' shirt.

"What's wrong, baby?" James asked, holding her as he walked back and forth. Frustration was bubbling up on his chest. He didn't _understand_ his daughter sometimes. "What's wrong with the stroller?"

Natasha coughed.

James sighed. "How about some water, then we can drive to the store, okay?"

"Jooze."

"No juice for you, we only have juice in the afternoons." James carefully set Natasha down on the counter. "And we'll go to the store to get milk. So now, it's water."

"Jooze?"

James smoothed Natasha's gossamer-fine hair back from her face. "Later. After lunch."

Natasha giggled, and held out her hands for the sippy cup of water.

Leaving the stroller in the house, James got Natasha into the jeep with a minimum of fuss. He'd held his breath for a few moments, wondering if Natasha's sudden aversion to the stroller would extend to her car seat, but either it hadn't or she was too distracted by the story book he handed her to make a fuss.

Since parking was non-existent at his usual store, James headed the extra distance to a larger store where he could park the jeep close enough to carry Natasha inside without too much hassle. Once inside, Natasha was over the moon at being able to ride in the shopping cart's seat, pointing at everything with her new word, "Yook!"

James obediently looked at many things in the store, from the cardboard cut-out of a large bear selling peanut butter, to a red laundry soap box, and everything in between. He managed to get milk and bread and cheese, and other things that they'd use eventually, then paid and got everything into the jeep without dropping the groceries or his child. Then home, where Natasha drank a sippy-cup of milk in her high chair while James put away the groceries.

After lunch, when Natasha was down for her afternoon nap, James went onto the parenting blogs to see if he could come up with a reason as to why Natasha suddenly hated the stroller. He came across a lot of results, but nothing useful. Some suggested distracting the child while strapping them in, others said that what was the harm in letting them run free? "Yeah, into traffic," James muttered as he closed the browser window and went upstairs to check on Natasha.

The little girl was still sleeping, curled around her Bear. James lowered himself into the armchair in the corner of the room to think.

Maybe it was a phase, maybe not. But James had to figure out how to get his little girl around down at a faster pace than she could walk. He couldn't very well carry her on his right arm; his VA-supplied prosthetic was fine at pushing buttons, but not much else. He wasn't even going to bother looking into getting a new stroller, those things were expensive.

James slumped down in the armchair. "What are we going to do with you, pumpkin?"

Natasha sighed in her sleep.

* * *

James' last try at getting Natasha to use the stroller ended up with them both in tears. James ended up hiding the stroller in his office so Natasha would stop screaming, then they went into the kitchen where Natasha tearfully ate yogurt while James fortified himself with another cup of coffee.

"Come on," James said when he'd wiped tears and yogurt off Natasha's face. "Let's go for a walk."

And walk they did, at a snail's pace all the way to the subway station, and from there into a sporting goods store in Manhattan. James had to carry Natasha the last few blocks, as her little legs had been getting quite a workout in the last few days. Inside the store, unable to find anyone to help him, he spent a frustrating ten minutes trying to figure out what kind of baby carrier he could use with just one hand. Natasha was engrossed in playing with a wall of socks next to the display, and paid her father no mind.

"Need a hand?"

James spun around so fast he nearly fell over. "Nick!" he said. "What the hell are you doing here?"

Nick Fury shook James' offered hand, then crouched down to pick up an ecstatic Natasha. "Saw you in the street," Nick said, bouncing Natasha on his arm. "I had to take a call, but then I thought I'd see if you were still here." He transferred his attention to the little girl. "What are you doing?" he asked, catching Natasha's hand before she ripped off his eye patch. "You treating your father all right?"

"No!"

James grinned. "She's walking now," he said, chucking Natasha under the chin. "And she won't ride in her stroller any more so I thought I'd try one of these things." He gestured vaguely at the wall of toddler hiking backpacks.

"Is that a fact?" Nick shifted Natasha higher on his arm. "You know, it's almost what you deserve, Barnes, a daughter as stubborn as you are."

"It's all right," James said, still smiling.

Natasha, knowing that she was being talked about, let out a happy shriek and tried to dive to the ground. Nick's quick reflexes hadn't deserted him after his forced retirement from the Rangers, and he caught her around the middle and put her down safely. "Tell you what, James, I got ten minutes before I need to head uptown. Let's see what we can do."

In true military fashion, the next ten minutes were spent in a quick test of the available backpacks. James needed one that he could put on with only one arm, and that he could put Natasha into without too much trouble. The ones that had metal framing worked the best, and Natasha was light enough that James wasn't worried about a bit of extra weight.

He finally decided on a dark blue backpack that held Natasha high enough to see over his shoulders. He paid, had the clerk cut off the tags at the register, and stuffed Natasha into the backpack to carry her out of the store. She burbled happily.

"Where you headed?" Nick asked, falling into step beside James on the sidewalk.

"To the subway and back home," James said. It felt strange, wearing Natasha on his back, but he'd survived years as a Ranger, carrying a full kit over hostile terrain. Compared to that, Natasha was as light as a feather.

"Not a bad day of shopping," Nick said, pulling ahead of James as the younger man slowed to turn left. "Hey, Barnes, you bring that little one into my office on Friday, okay?"

"Why?" James called, catching Natasha's hand as she smacked him on the ear.

Nick turned back to him. There was an expression on the man's face that made James' heart leap. "That last step in finding Natasha's birth father came up empty," Nick said, hands in his pockets. "The file's been closed and the adoption's been fully approved."

For a moment, James' knees turned to jelly. All the hurdles in the paperwork, all the uncertainty of wondering if anything would tear Natasha away from him, all gone now. "Are you—" James stopped himself before he swore in front of his daughter. "—kidding me?"

"I don't joke about adoption," Nick said, trying to look stern, and failing. "Now, you come see me on Friday and we'll get you up before a judge in a month or two. That sound good?"

"Yes, _sir!_ " James waved Natasha's little hand at Nick, who rolled his eye and walked away.

"Yook!" Natasha said, waving her hands just within James' peripheral vision. He turned his head and caught one of her hands, and kissed her chubby fingers. "Daddy!"

"That's right," James said, so unexpectedly overwhelmed that he was afraid he might cry in the middle of the street. "I'm going to be your legal dad real soon, sweet pea. I'm going to be around for ever and ever."

"Yook!" Natasha commanded, pointing. "Ogg!"

James took a deep breath. Natasha didn't care about adoptions or paperwork. All she cared about was walking and doggies and snacks, and that was just perfect. "Yup, that's a dog," James said, carrying Natasha down the street towards the subway station. "What do you say we go home and have a snack?"

" 'nack!" Natasha crowed in approval, and James started laughing in relief.

It had been a strange week, but everyone was getting exactly what they wanted.

He wouldn't have it any other way.


	10. The One on New Year’s Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set the New Year's Day up a few months after the current point of Hands of Clay. No spoilers for the rest of the story, just James making a lot of faces.
> 
> I realized I didn't have one of these where Natasha is the narrator, so here you go. Happy New Year!

* * *

Natasha opened her eyes suddenly. It was dark, but she _knew,_ she just _knew_ , that it was New Year's morning!

Natasha sat up, sending Bear flying, then lay back down again. It was cold! Daddy had said that it was going to be a cold year, but Natasha didn't think he meant right _away_.

Still, it was New Year's Day, and Natasha was determined to start the year right. That was what everyone had kept saying at the party last night, with their resolutions and their champagne and their cheering.

(Natasha had tasted the champagne, on a spoon, out of Maria's glass. She didn't like champagne and told Maria so.)

Then everyone had cheered but Natasha had been so sleepy by then that she didn't remember much, just that Daddy put her to bed and then she was asleep. But now, she was awake, and she had a _plan_.

(This was her very own plan. She hadn't even told Clint! Because he would want to help, and then it wouldn't be Natasha's very own plan anymore.)

Taking a deep breath, Natasha slid out of bed. She shivered across the floor to her closet, where she pulled on her brand new bathrobe that she'd gotten for Christmas and her brand new slippers that looked like cats. With her new penguin pajamas, she was all ready for the new year!

Natasha went into the hall. Clint's bedroom door was half-open, so Natasha looked inside. Clint was still asleep, huddled up under his blankets with only the tip of his nose out in the air. Natasha pushed down an urge to go and pinch his nose – that would wake him up and besides, Daddy said that she should only wake people up with her words, not by putting things up their nose.

Sometimes, Daddy was no fun.

So Natasha left Clint alone and walked down the hall. Daddy's bedroom door was open but the room was empty. Downstairs, Natasha could hear voices. She hoped that Daddy and Steve were in the living room, and not the kitchen, because if they were in the kitchen she couldn't carry out her plan.

She sat on the top step and quietly bumped her way down. She could see Steve's hair sticking up over the edge of the sofa, and could hear him and Daddy talking. _Whew,_ Natasha thought. They weren't in the kitchen.

Reaching the floor, Natasha stood up and shuffled her slippers over to the kitchen. There was a moment when she had to make a dash for it, but no one saw her as she darted into the kitchen. It was warmer in here, so Daddy must have turned the heat on when he got up to make the coffee.

Now, Natasha said to herself as she surveyed the scene. To work.

The first thing she did was to put the plates and utensils on the table. Then she went to the pantry cupboard (Steve insisted on calling it that and it was kind of silly but _pantry_ was a fun word) and dug around behind the soup cans to find the chocolate chips. Daddy thought that Natasha didn't know they were there, but Natasha knew, because it was chocolate and she _loved_ chocolate just a little less than she loved cheese. She carried the chocolate chips to the table, then went back for the cupcake sprinkles.

Natasha was just about to open the fridge when she heard footsteps, then Steve walked into the kitchen. "Good morning, Natasha," he said, with a big smile on his face.

"Shh!" Natasha said sharply. "Be _quiet_ , it's a _surprise_!"

"What's a surprise?" Steve asked in a whisper, crouching down. His hair was sticking all up and he looked silly.

"I'm making a New Year's Day breakfast surprise!" she said. "Don't spoil it!"

"Okay." Steve was still smiling. He had been smiling a lot since he and Clint moved into Natasha's house. He must like it here, Natasha reasoned. "Do you need any help?"

"Yes." Natasha scratched her nose. "Can you get the toaster? Please?"

Steve got the toaster from the counter and put it on the table and plugged it in for Natasha. "Anything else?"

"No. Go away until Clint wakes up."

"Sure thing."

From the living room came Daddy's voice. "Hey, where's my coffee?"

"Gimme a minute," Steve called back.

"Remember!" Natasha said. "It's a surprise!"

"I remember." Steve gave Natasha a pat on the head, and she blew a raspberry at him, and he smiled again as he went to get Daddy more coffee.

Once Steve was safely out of the kitchen, Natasha ran to the fridge. She got the peanut butter and carried that to the table, then went back for the very special ingredient.

The can of whipping cream!

Natasha carried this to the table and put it in the place of honour by her plate. Then she sat back and considered. Was she missing anything?

From the living room, she heard Daddy say loudly, "Gee, I'm sure hungry for breakfast. I wonder what we should have today."

Then Steve said, also loud, "I'm sure that whatever we have will be a wonderful New Year's Day breakfast, together."

Natasha giggled as she got down from her chair. Her plan was so good! Everyone would be so surprised!

As she was in the fridge to get two tiny milks (one for her, and one for Clint), she heard shuffling upstairs. Natasha ran to put the milk on the table, then darted into the living room to hide behind the armchair. Daddy and Steve, sitting up on the couch, didn't see her, but she could see them. She giggled again. They were going to be so surprised!

More shuffling, and Clint bumped down the stairs. He had his glasses on and his hearing aid in, but he looked like he was still asleep. "Urgh," he said.

"Hey, buddy," Steve said, and Clint stumbled over to the couch and climbed up. "Happy New Year."

"Urgh," Clint said again. "Where's Natasha?"

This was it. This was her moment. Natasha sprang up and shouted, "Surprise!"

Clint opened his eyes wide, shocked awake. "Surprise!" he yelled back. "What's the surprise?"

Natasha ran over to the couch, where Daddy scooped her up into a big hug. "Happy New Year, sweet pea," he said into her ear.

She gave him a hug back, her biggest hug yet. "Happy New Year, Daddy!" She gave him a kiss on his prickly cheek. "You have a pineapple face today!"

"What's a pineapple face?" Clint demanded, while Steve laughed and Daddy made a face.

"He's all pointy like a pineapple." Natasha reached for Clint's hand. "Feel it."

Daddy sat and let them all poke their fingers in his face for a few moments. "All right, all right," he said finally, pushing Steve's hand away while Natasha and Clint giggled. "Why ain't you calling Steve a pineapple face?"

"Because I didn't give him a new year's kiss," Natasha said, because _obviously_. "Come eat breakfast!"

She raced Clint into the kitchen, then she raced back because Daddy and Steve were taking _forever_. "We're on our way," Steve said, as she tried to pull them along faster.

Why were grown-ups so _slow_?

Finally, everyone was in the kitchen. "Daddy, get the bread for toast," Natasha demanded. He did so, but he was moving so slow that Natasha got behind him to give him a push on his bum. "Faster!"

In a quick motion, Daddy turned around and scooped Natasha up over his shoulder. She squealed and kicked and lost a slipper by the time Daddy dropped her onto her chair.

She glared up at him. "That is not what I mean!"

Daddy sat down. "I hurried up though, right?" he said. "Okay, now what?"

"Make toast." Natasha looked around. "I will make for you the _best_ New Year's Day breakfast, because you are all my family!"

"What's in it?" Clint demanded breathlessly, while Daddy made a weird face and blinked too hard.

"All the _best_ things!" Natasha reached for the chocolate chips. "Just you see!"

Clint followed along as Natasha demonstrated her New Year's masterpiece: toast with peanut butter and chocolate chips, then topped with whipped cream and sprinkles.

When he was done adding sprinkles, Clint sat back and admired his creation. "You sure have good ideas, Natasha!" he said.

Natasha felt happy-warm from the tips of her toes to the top of her head. "Thank you!" she said. "I sure am glad you live here and are my family!"

Clint grinned. "Me too!"

Meanwhile, Daddy was making that weird face again. "Are you kids going to try that?" he said, his voice all gruff and rumbly.

"Yes!" And Natasha picked up her toast to take her first bite.

It was wonderful. Peanut butter and chocolate and whipped cream! She chewed happily. She loved peanut butter and chocolate and whipped cream!

Across the table, Clint was devouring his breakfast toast. He had whipped cream on his nose and on his fingers and Natasha didn't laugh at him but she did think he was pretty funny looking.

"Aren't you going to try some?" Steve was saying to Daddy.

Daddy stopped making his weird face and looked at Steve. "You first."

"No, I insist."

Natasha rolled her eyes. Grown-ups were so silly. "You can have a bite of mine," she offered, pushing her plate over. After all, it was polite to share, and Natasha was a very polite little girl. Sometimes. When she remembered.

"Thank you, Natasha, that's very nice," Daddy said. He picked up the toast and took a bite. His face changed, but that must mean that he liked it. "Huh."

Steve's eyebrows went up. "Huh?"

Daddy put the toast down and pushed the plate at Steve. "You're next."

Steve stared at the toast. The corner of his mouth twitched.

"Hey, Natasha!" Clint interrupted.

"What?"

Clint licked whipped cream off his hands. "Let's put jam on!"

"Jam!" Natasha exclaimed. She hadn't even thought of jam!

Together, Natasha and Clint ran for the fridge and came back with the strawberry jam (for Clint) and the marmalade (for Natasha). When they got to the table, Natasha could see that another bite had been taken out of her toast. She put the jar down and pulled her plate back, glaring at the grown-ups.

"You make your own now," she said.

"Great idea," Daddy said. He stood up. "How about we round out this meal with some eggs and leftover vegetables, huh?"

"Yes please," said Steve immediately, which he had to say because he was an adult and adults had to eat vegetables.

"I guess," Natasha grumbled.

Clint didn't appear to have heard them. Daddy touched Clint on the shoulder. "Clint, do you want some eggs?" he asked, as he made the one-handed sign for scrambled eggs.

Clint signed back _yes_ , then went back to the jam jar.

"I want to help," Natasha said, reaching up and wiggling her fingers. Daddy came around the table and picked her up, carrying her over to the stove. "Daddy, did you like my New Year's surprise?" Natasha asked.

Instead of putting her on the counter, Daddy gave her another big hug. "I liked it very much," he said into her hair.

Natasha hugged back with all her might. "Daddy," she said, "Last night, Maria said this is going to be the best year ever."

"Did she?" Daddy bounced Natasha on his arm until she sat back to look at him. His eyes were red and he looked a little funny, so she patted him on the cheek. "Maria is very smart."

"Uh huh." Natasha gave in to temptation and pinched Daddy's nose, just a little pinch. "This year, I will turn _six_."

"Yes, you will," Daddy said. He kissed her on the forehead, then set her on the counter. "And you'll go to school, and learn all kinds of new things."

"And I get to go to ballet," Natasha added, getting into the swing of things. "And karate. And swim lessons! And I get to see Maria, and Skye, and Director Fury!"

"You sure will," Daddy said with a grin. He pulled the egg carton out of the fridge and put it beside Natasha.

"And do you know what else?" Natasha opened the egg carton. "I bet this is the year I go to Disneyland." She eyed her father to see what he made of this.

Daddy put the mixing bowl on the counter, then bent down to look Natasha in the eye. "Do you know what?" he said, then winked. "I bet you're right."

Natasha clasped her hands together in glee, then made the sign for _excited!_ several times. Daddy smiled a big smile.

"Okay, kiddo, we got work to do," he said, handing over the egg beater. "Let's get cracking!"

"I will crack the eggs!" Natasha exclaimed.

"Can I supervise?" Daddy asked.

"Okay." And as Natasha reached for the first egg, she couldn't help but let out a sigh of happiness.

This was going to be the best year of her _life_.

* * *

_What Bucky said to Steve as the children were distracted._

"Why you looking at me like that?" Steve said, keeping his voice low.

Bucky made a face. "That is the single most disgusting thing I have ever put in my mouth," he said, grimacing. "And I spent eight years eating Army food."

"It can't be that bad," Steve protested.

Bucky glared at him. "Try it."

Steve picked up the toast. The whipped cream on top was starting to get a bit runny. He opened his mouth and took a small bite.

The explosion of _sweet_ and _fat_ caught on the back of his tongue, and he quickly put the toast down. He chewed a few times, then grabbed at Bucky's coffee cup to wash it all down.

"Yeah," Bucky said as the kids returned to the table with jam. "Like I said."

Steve gave a shudder, then drank more coffee to get the taste of that much sweetness out of his mouth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The sign for scrambled eggs [http://www.handspeak.com/word/list/index.php?abc=ea&id=5602](http://www.handspeak.com/word/list/index.php?abc=ea&id=5602)
> 
> The sign for excited [http://www.handspeak.com/word/list/index.php?abc=ex&id=702](http://www.handspeak.com/word/list/index.php?abc=ex&id=702)


	11. The One on Valentine’s Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set the February after the current place in Hands of Clay (sneaking this in just before Valentine's Day ends here)

* * *

James closed the oven door and considered. The roast and potatoes were in the oven, the salad chopped and in the fridge, and the beverages (champagne for him and Steve, sparkling apple juice for the kids) were chilling on the back step.

Valentine's Day dinner was going to be _perfect_.

After washing his hand, James shuffled into the living room to flop down on the couch. Steve was out with the kids at the Children's Museum, keeping them occupied while James did Saturday chores and got dinner ready. Any other weekend, James might have preferred to go with them, but Natasha and Clint had eaten so much Valentine's chocolate that morning that they were bouncing off the walls by the time Steve wrestled them out of the house.

Poor Steve, James thought, then cracked a smile. Steve could handle himself.

He checked his phone. No new messages, but Steve's last text had indicated that they would probably get home around five thirty, and they could eat as soon as dinner was ready.

James put his phone on the coffee table. He'd had a hell of an afternoon, taking care of laundry and cleaning and cooking. He had been working so hard, all in an effort to get things ready, he could almost make himself forget what day this was.

His first Valentine's Day with Steve.

James took a deep breath. He still wasn't sure what a relationship was supposed to feel like, but since Clint and Steve had moved into the house at the beginning of November, things _fit_ , as if this was the way everything was supposed to be.

It fit that Clint and Natasha both had the run of the house. It was right for James to take both kids to school in the morning, after Steve left for work. And at the end of a long day, when Steve came home, it was the most natural thing in the world to ask Steve about his day, and talk about his own, and for everyone to sit together at the dining room table, and end the night by going to bed together.

Some days, James was afraid to put too much weight on things, in case everything shattered out from under him.

His phone beeped. James picked it up to see a new message from Steve. _Leaving now be home in 15._

That didn't leave James with a lot of time. Everything was ready, true, but James was suddenly struck with a fresh wave of anxiety about his Valentine's present for Steve. Maybe it was too much for the first Valentine's. Maybe James should have held off until Steve's birthday.

Well, too late now. James got to his feet and hurried upstairs to change into nicer clothes. He wasn't going to be able to pull something else out of his hat before Steve and the kids got home.

* * *

“Happy Valentine's Day!”

“Yeah, Happy Valentine's Day!”

James was nearly knocked to the ground by two enthusiastic children. “Did you have fun at the museum?” he asked.

“Yes!” Clint exclaimed, punching the air. “I got licked by an iguana!”

“I touched a starfish,” Natasha said, wiggling a finger in James' face. “With my _finger_. It was slimy and pokey.”

“That sounds great,” James said, kissing first Natasha's cheek, then Clint's. Clint giggled, then wandered off to shrug out of his parka while Natasha leaned against James' shoulder. “Do you want to go again some day?”

“Okay.” Natasha wiggled her starfishy-finger in James' face once more, then reached for her jacket buttons.

Steve stomped into the house, his boots in hand and a large shopping bag in the other. Even though it had only been four hours since he'd left, James' heart skipped in his chest at the sight of Steve.

His family was home, and everything was _perfect._

“Jackets in the closet,” Steve was saying to the children. He set his boots down on the mat, and not-very-subtly tried to stuff the bag behind the hall table. “Then go wash your hands.”

The children moaned and groaned at this directive, but in a few minutes everything was in its place and Clint and Natasha were fighting over the footstool in the kitchen, leaving James and Steve alone.

“Hey,” James said. “The kids wear you out?”

Steve closed the closet door with a sigh. “Yeah.” He sounded tired.

“Anything go wrong?” James asked. “Nat didn't have to use her emergency inhaler, did she?”

“No, she was fine.” Steve ran his hand through his hair. “Clint too, just… they're a handful, sometimes.”

“How is that any different than normal?” James asked, putting his hand on Steve's arm. He wasn't surprised in the least when Steve stepped into an embrace. Steve's arms around him were solid and bracing; James let himself press his face against Steve's neck, moved his hand flat on Steve's back. This was what he missed when Steve wasn't around – that feeling of safety and security; of home.

“I missed you today,” Steve whispered.

James smiled against Steve's shoulder. “It was either that, or stay home and do chores with me, he said as he lifted his head.

Steve wrinkled his nose. It was simply too cute, and James leaned in for a kiss. Luckily, Steve was all too happy to oblige.

A beeping from the kitchen eventually pulled James away. “The roast,” James murmured in explanation. “Be right back.”

In the kitchen, Natasha and Clint had settled at the table, having pushed James' carefully arranged table setting out of the way so they could draw. “Daddy, there's beeping,” Natasha told him as he walked into the room. “Make it stop.”

“As you wish.” James turned off the timer, then turned down the oven temperature. “What are you drawing?”

Natasha displayed her paper. “This is the starfish,” she informed her father. “The one I touched. His name is Sebastian. Like in the Little Mermaid.”

James smoothed down Natasha's hair. “I thought Sebastian was a crab.”

Natasha huffed. “Daddy, he _is_ , but a starfish can also be named Sebastian, there isn't a _law_.”

Across the table, Clint held up his paper. It was covered in hearts. “I'm drawing a Valentine card for my mommy,” he said. “For when I see her on Tuesday.”

“You already made a card for your mom in class on Friday,” Natasha objected.

Clint went back to his paper. “I'm making another one.”

James squeezed Natasha's shoulder. “Natasha, it's okay if Clint wants to make two cards for his mother. He can make ten, if that's what he wants to do.”

Natasha sat back on her heels. “I don't want to make another card for you, Daddy.”

“And you don't have to.” James leaned down to kiss the top of Natasha's head. “You can do whatever you want, because you're both big kids now.”

“If I was a big kid, I could drive,” Natasha said.

“If I was a big kid, I could climb every tree,” Clint put in.

“And when you're done these drawings, you can draw those things.” James moved around the table to ruffle Clint's hair. “Can you two hang out here on your own for a little bit? I need to talk to Steve.”

“Okay.”

“Uh huh.”

“And don't touch the oven door, it's hot,” was James' parting shot as he headed back into the living room. What he saw pulled him up short.

Steve was holding a wrapped present, and was smiling at him. “Happy Valentine's Day,” Steve said as he held out the present. “I got you something.”

Twin waves of relief (Steve had gotten him a present, so at least what James had planned wouldn't be weird) and anxiety (why hadn't he gotten something that could be wrapped?) washed over James as he crossed the room. “What is it?” he blurted out.

“Open it and find out,” Steve said, his smile widening.

James had to sit on the couch before Steve could hand him the gift, and even then Steve had to steady one edge as James pulled off the paper.

It was a large framed photograph of the four of them, taken at the New Year's Eve party in the house. Steve and James were seated on the couch, the kids sitting on their laps. Clint was grinning, his wide smile showing off his first missing tooth. Natasha was curled on James' lap, still pale and thin from her ordeal in the fall, but she was smiling and her eyes were glowing.

In the photograph, Steve had his arm over James' shoulders and was beaming as if he had been handed the entire world.

“Steve, I…” James trailed off, at a loss for words.

“Do you like it?” Steve asked, putting his arm around James' shoulder in an echo of the photo.

James leaned against Steve, a lump in his throat. “ ‘Course I love it,” he said, then coughed to clear his throat. “I'm going to put it up in my office.”

“Good,” Steve whispered. He kissed James' ear. “When Maria showed me the picture, I knew I had to get it framed.”

James took a deep breath. “I got you something too,” he said as he carefully placed the frame on the coffee table. “Come on, I'll show you.”

Steve bounced to his feet and helped James up. “What is it?” Steve asked, hyper as a puppy. “Chocolate?”

“No, because if I give you chocolate, you share it with the kids and then no one gets any sleep,” James said, taking Steve by the hand to haul him up the stairs.

“Is it in the bedroom?” Steve asked as they turned onto the second level. “Or the bathroom?”

“Nope.” James pulled Steve along up the staircase to the third floor. “But you gotta tell me if you hate it.”

“I don't hate it, Bucky.”

“You don't even know what it is.”

“I'd love anything you got for me.”

James rolled his eyes. “Great, then next year I'm getting you a pair of socks.”

“I like socks,” Steve said, squeezing James' hand. “Keeping warm's important.”

“Yeah, yeah.” James stopped in front of a closed door. “Here you go.”

Steve raised his eyebrows. “You got me a storage room?”

“Shut up.” James gave Steve a shove. “Go in.”

This was it, James told himself as Steve went to open the door. Three weeks of secret planning and effort when Steve was at work and the kids at school. Some of the furniture hadn't arrived yet, and the biggest pieces he was waiting to order after he saw Steve's reaction to the room.

The door opened onto a dark room. Steve stood looking at the darkness for a moment, until James lost patience and brushed past him to turn on the lights. “Here,” James said as he backed into the room. “This is for you.”

Steve just stared. James nervously gestured at the windows. “This is the south side of the building, so you can get great sunlight,” he said. “The floor's straight and the heating's okay, so you can use it in the winter too.”

“Bucky, what is this?” Steve said in wonder as he walked into the room. “Wait, is that my old drawing table?”

“Yeah, Abraham shipped it up,” James said nervously. “You were saying a while ago that you missed being able to draw, so I thought you should have some space to get away from us and do that.” He touched the edge of the drawing table. “I've got my office and the workshop downstairs. You should have some space of your own, too. This is your house too.”

For a long moment, Steve didn't move, just stared at James. A thousand worries flew though James' head – Steve hated it, it was a dumb idea, that James should just have just bought some hand tools or something…

And then Steve was moving, cupping James' face with his hands and he was kissing James and James was kissing him back and all James' worries fell down into nothingness.

“Thank you,” Steve whispered, then went back to kissing James. This time, a few minutes went by before Steve broke the kiss. “God, Bucky, I've been wanting to get back to drawing but I didn't know how to start, and this, this is _perfect_.”

James put his arm around Steve's shoulders, the embrace tight. “I got a catalog you can order some art stuff from,” he said, speaking around the fluttering in his chest. Steve was _happy_. “The lady at the store said you need a light table. You need a light table? Maybe I can make you one better'n you could buy.”

Steve chuckled, his arms warm and strong. “You probably could.” He leaned back to look at James. “This is the best Valentine's present I ever had.”

James ran his thumb over Steve's cheek. “It's just a room.”

“It's not just the room,” Steve said, his voice low. “It's everything.”

James smiled, and leaned in to kiss Steve again.

“Come on,” Steve said after a few minutes. “Let's go look at that art catalogue with the kids.”

“Yeah,” James said. He squeezed Steve's hand. “I bet Nat offers to share her crayons with you.”

“Well, she has lots,” Steve said, holding James hand as they headed back downstairs.

This, James reflected, was _perfect_. Steve settled in James' house, with a space of his own for his art; the children safe and busy, and a great dinner cooking in the kitchen.

James had never been so happy in his life.


	12. The One With 28 Collected Tumblr Short-Fics

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here is the collected Hands of Clay short-fics from my Tumblr, in quick story format (with a few character meta thrown in for good measure).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> They’re not nearly as well planned as my other outtakes, but I thought that I would share these all with you here in the order I wrote them. I’ve jump-linked the subject lines at the top.
> 
> Hope this tides you over for a bit until the next chapter of Hands of Clay!

  * Bucky, Steve and Clint go to a baseball game
  * Clint and Natasha are playing “Baby”
  * Bucky gives Steve a key to his house 
  * Steve and Natasha chat about being adopted
  * The one where Steve wears a Speedo (and Bucky has a heart attack)
  * The one where we learn about what happens as the kids grow up (Plus babies!)
  * Okay fine more about the babies
  * Wherein teenage Bucky decides to join the Army
  * How Steve got from art school to head of philanthropy at Stark Industries 
  * A sidebar to look at Sam Wilson who is awesome
  * So where are the Howling Commandos in all of this?
  * Steve's childhood before he was adopted and what he wants for Clint
  * Summertime in the city is too damned hot
  * Toddler Natasha learns a new phrase AKA Salt n Vinegar 
  * A bit of meta on James' father AND also some fluff on Wanda and Pietro making friends with baby Vision 
  * How Clint got into archery and how Natasha discovered karate/ballet
  * Halloween!
  * So what about Christmas and Hanukkah? (also lots about Grandpa Abraham)
  * How many Situation Codes do James and Natasha have?
  * Five birthdays
  * And following up on that ^^: some meta on James' life as a teenager with discussion around depression and isolation
  * Natasha versus Cheese Appreciation Day
  * Steve's romantic relationships before Bucky
  * OMG Clint gets a dog!
  * James' first birthday when Steve and Clint are around 
  * So who gives the kids the sex talk?
  * Clint and Bucky paint Clint's glasses
  * Steve Rogers breaks his arm by falling off Abraham's roof 



**Bucky, Steve and Clint go to a baseball game (set in mid-July)**

I originally had the idea of having Bucky give Steve tickets to a ball game but it felt a little lacking, you know, then the idea of Bucky to give Steve the tickets for him "and a special someone" and the first idea in Steve's head was _with you, of course_ only there's this moment of _wait what do i do now_ and Bucky's smiling this sad, sad little smile and Steve goes from _wait why_ to _oh yeah Bucky liked baseball_ and blurts out a "hey you should totally come with me!"

and while Bucky is dying on the inside (not about the game, about the _special someone_ part) Clint perks up and runs over and he's like "whatcha doing?" and Bucky makes a weird face that Steve just can't read and Bucky's all "hey we can take the kids, make it a day" and Steve is just so disappointed because (he realizes with a pang) he wants a little one-on-one time with Bucky (yes in that way too) but Clint is making these huge sad anime eyes and Steve can never say no to that so he's all "good idea, family outing" and only then does he realize what he's said. _Family_. They're not a family, they're two grown men and their kids but then he is all _what if?_

But Nat throws a spanner into the works with her abject refusal to go to a baseball game (it takes James a few weeks to get it out of her but she though baseball was like soccer _aka the most boring sport ever_ ) so there's some juggling but in the end Maria takes Natasha for a "manicure day" (and you can bet there's some weird parenting moments around gender stereotyping for Bucky on that one) and James, Steve and Clint head off for a baseball game.

They take the subway and Clint is _super-excited omg yes!_ and it requires both Steve and Bucky holding his hands to keep him from flinging himself into _adventure._ They have seats in the outfield because it was all Bucky could find for that game and he's worried that Steve will think it's too cheap but Steve's smiling almost as much as Clint. They settle down and Steve spends a while explaining the sport of baseball to Clint and eventually the game starts and instead of Clint getting all fidgety, he's hyper-focused on the action at home plate and Bucky and Steve realize that Clint can see the action really clear (hello farsightedness) and he's totally into it and gets indignant when he thinks the umpire makes the wrong calls on walks vs strikes. It's a little unnerving for Steve but Bucky's encouraging Clint every step of the way.

Then they get hot dogs and drinks and Clint is in junk food heaven. The innings pass and it's the bottom of the sixth when someone hits a home run and the ball flies right at our little crew and Clint drops his drink and tries to jump up onto the seats to catch the ball and Steve dives to catch Clint before the boy falls and bashes his head open and that leaves Bucky to lean back and catch the ball like he does this for a living and everyone's cheering and Clint is screaming and then when Bucky hands him the ball he nearly dies of excitement. Clint falls asleep on the subway home and Bucky takes pictures on his phone for posterity. Steve and Bucky sit side by side, Clint drooling on Steve's shoulder, and Steve says to Bucky, "This might just be my best birthday ever" and Bucky smiles that smile Steve remembered from when they were kids, open and happy and Steve's heart grows two sizes that day. Then they get home and Bucky finds out that Nat changed her mind on the manicure and wanted to go into for a walk instead to a street fair and there was a martial arts demonstration and anyway tl'dr that is the story of how five-year-old Natasha had her very first Taekwondo class (and Bucky's head explodes) and everyone had the best day ever.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/102566430682/sotto-accorgersi-replied-to-your-post-writing-the>

**Clint and Natasha are playing "Baby"** (set in the summer)

So Bucky's watching the kids and doing his taxes or something boring and up the kids toddle and Nat explains how she has a 'baby' now, and Bucky asks who the baby's daddy is, because, well, this is new, and Natasha gets this prim look on her face and says that her baby is adopted and so is Clint's and the babies play together and eat pizza together and are going to Disneyland together and Clint's nodding along in the background, and then Natasha holds out her 'baby' to James (it's a pair of his folded up sweat socks with big eyes drawn on the heels in marker) and Clint plops his baby (a soup can with a mermaid sticker on the top) onto the table and goes to get some juice.

Bucky, who has been through these little gems too often to let this one get away, picks up his phone and turns on the video to ask the kids what their babies' names are.

"Boo-Lee," Natasha says, tenderly cuddling the sock-baby.

"And Ham," Clint adds, tucking his soup-baby under his arm to carry his grape juice back upstairs.

Bucky waits for the kids to leave before he turns the camera to his face and raises his eyebrows at the lens. "Boo-Lee and Ham," he repeats. "Nice, traditional baby names for the grandkids."

He sends the video to Steve with no additional explanation and three hours later he gets a text message back that's just a selfie of Steve with his eyebrows raised in confusion.

(Bucky makes that his phone's background for a few days)

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/108578783007/lunchtime-rambles>

**Bucky gives Steve a key to his house** (set before [chapter 15](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2143266/chapters/8051649?view_adult=true))

So I was thinking about the "Steve has a key to Bucky's house" and was trying to figure how it would have happened. Probably because Steve's there so often, coming to drop Clint off or coming home from work or just to chill on the weekends and it's getting a bit awkward for Bucky but he can't think of a way to give Steve a spare key because giving Steve? a key?? to his home???? Also there's the whole "what will he think???" going thru Bucky's head, but he eventually (probably after Sharon comes by) thinks that he needs to stop freaking out, it's just a _key_.

So he calls his locksmith and gets a duplicate key made (it's not as simple as just cutting a new one; there's a computer chip in the key, sort of like the engine-locking car keys in more modern cars b/c security) and then on the day of his next physio appointment, he texts Steve to set up a lunch afterwards and Steve's totally into it, any chance to get away from the office ya know? So they go out and Steve orders a sandwich and Bucky gets a bagel and all the while Bucky's rehearsing what he wants to say, like he's been practicing for days on end. In the end, tho, Bucky just reaches into his pocket while Steve's talking about something cute Clint did at the grocery store the previous evening, and tosses it at Steve with a "Here, got this for you."

Steve knows what it is, of course (he's used Bucky's key to get in at times when they all come back from the park and stuff) and he's trying to play it as cool as Bucky is, all like "hey thanks man, this is cool," and they're each trying to out-cool each other only after they part ways (Steve for work and Bucky for Brooklyn and a play-date at the park with the kids) they each have a mini-meltdown, Steve in his office chair spinning while he's just so happy, he's getting along with Bucky so well, and it's so _great_! And Bucky's more than a little weak in the knee all the way back to Brooklyn, because Steve has a key to his ~~heart~~ house and he knows he's in so deep and Steve will never know that Bucky's in love with him ~~and they're both idiots~~.

So yeah, that's how Steve has a key to Bucky's house.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/115891218982/so-i-was-thinking-about-the-steve-has-a-key-to>

**Steve and Natasha chat about being adopted** (set in the middle of [Chapter 17](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2143266/chapters/8925922))

It's before lunch on Clint's birthday and after three hours in the pool they all came back to the carriage house and the grown-ups got Clint and Natasha to sit quietly on the couch "for a few minutes" and of course they're napping in 2 seconds. Then James says he may as well keep them company and he sits down and he's out in three minutes. So Steve (who is _pining_ ) sits and draws this happy family because everything is perfect and Bucky is perfect and anyway after 45 minutes Natasha wakes up and goes to poke at Steve, and to keep her quiet (Clint and Bucky are still zonked out) they sit together and color. And then this exchange happens:

**Natasha** : When the grandpa came to adopt you, were you happy?

**Steve** : Yes, I was. I wanted to have a family of my own. But I missed your dad so much. He was my best friend.

**Natasha** : I am happy I am adopted. I like my room and my toys and Daddy and going to dance class and my teachers. When I was a baby, Director Fury took me to a hospital because I was sick and then he went and he found me the very _best_ daddy, that's what he said. The _best_ daddy.

**Steve** : I'm really glad to hear that.

**Natasha** : _*colors furiously*_ When did you know you were a best friend?

**Steve** : Well, I met Bucky on the playground on the first day of school. One of the kids was making fun of me, and I remember that your dad stepped in and told that boy to leave me alone. Then we were best friends. When did you know that you and Clint were best friends?

**Natasha** : I knew Clint was my best friend when he came to my house and he met my spiders and we looked at birds and we talked about dinosaurs and he was nice. Sometimes, at school, the boys don't play with me because I'm a girl. That makes me mad. Girls like to play dinosaur too. Clint plays dinosaur with me and we have fun and we make up stories and paint pictures and play in the sprinkler and we'll be best friends _forever_. Until I'm two hundred and eight.

**Steve** : It's so great that you and Clint are best friends. Being a best friend is the best thing in the world.

**Natasha** : The _best_.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/117225849267/ooooo-i-personally-would-love-to-see-steves-pov>

**The one where Steve wears a Speedo (and Bucky has a heart attack)** (set in [chapter 10](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2143266/chapters/5683961))

okay so first off Steve grabbed that in a hurry that morning because getting Clint a) up and b) dressed and c) out the door takes most of his energy and he wasn't thinking too hard about bathing suits for the swimming lessons later that afternoon. However. When he realized (around noon) that he had set himself up to be wearing a speedo in front of his crush that afternoon, he had a wtf moment then spent like an hour in the gym and had a salad for lunch, lest he not look his best.

Then, when faced with the actual situation, he decided that all he could do was stand up straight, act nonchalant, and go for it. It was just a swim suit, after all. And Bucky was just a friend.

(When Tony heard this story later that week, he nearly banged his head down on his desk because Steve, oh my god, you totally need to tell this guy you want to jump him.

What? No, Tony, we're just–

Shut up you don't even hear yourself you're taking his daughter to swim class and he's watching your son all summer–

the nanny is doing that–

I can't listen to this anymore, your obliviousness hurts me.

I'm going back to work.

Hey, ask him if he wants to see your etchings sometimes, see if that works, all right?)

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/117480003887/can-you-tell-us-what-steve-was-thinking-when-he>

**The one where we learn about what happens as the kids grow up (Plus babies!)** (set post-story)

oh man I have so many thoughts after the main body of the story ends. Like, Kate Bishop joins Clint's archery team when she's eleven and he's thirteen, and she's _really good_ and everyone wonders if there's going to be this epic rivalry and instead they both challenge each other and there's a lot of respect going on and as Clint puts it, they can't be on the same Olympic team so they may as well help each other out, that's what a team does, right? And Steve cannot disagree. 

Also Bobbi Morse is Clint's first girlfriend, when they're both 15 and meet at a science fair and it's a huge wake-up call to Bucky and Steve, because Bucky had no idea how to handle 15 year old boy/girl couples (also, 15) and Steve's in some sort of delusion about Clint's still a baby (Natasha sets them straight because _seriously_ )

And that leads us to Natasha, who drops out of ballet when she's ten because the dance mistress tells her that to proceed in ballet she has to drop her karate and judo classes because they're causing unsightly muscles to develop, and Natasha walks out of her class then and there and Bucky finds her on the steps when he comes to pick her up and she's not crying; she's seething, because she loves ballet and she loves her martial arts classes and she will not allow her future and her worth as an individual to be dictated by adults' perceptions of her physical appearance. 

(She cries herself to sleep for a week and Bucky wants to go punch someone but Steve points out that physical assault is illegal and wrong)

Natasha spends her teen years picking up more and more martial arts skills and she tells Bucky it's because she's going to be a stunt artist when she graduates. She's not joking.

She does have a harder time making friends than Clint, and when she meets Matt Murdock when they're both sixteen, she's not sure what she wants. Does she want a friend? A boyfriend? A girlfriend? None of the above? But she and Matt turn into super good friends and Natasha never laughs at the idea of a blind boy in a judo class because everyone else can go screw themselves and anyway Matt can kick their asses. 

But the real question you had, about Bucky and Steve adopting another kid, is an option. They're both young and successful and if they do decide to adopt another child, they know who to ask to put them on the list (Nick Fury), and Bucky's got more than enough space in the house for another crib or two. 

(I say _two_ because Nicky Fury shows up one day with two littles, a brother and sister, twins, not even a year old who have had a really tough time of things after their mother died. Little Wanda makes chaos wherever she goes, while her brother Pietro is fast on his feet for a baby and nearly makes an escape at every turn. The babies _adore_ Steve and Clint and Clint's dog Lucky, and they clamber all over Bucky for stories and their bottles and everything. Natasha is stand-offish for a while (she's angry at Bucky for taking in another redheaded baby girl, why wasn't she enough?) but she's the only one who can stop Pietro from crying at night and Wanda loves her because of that and really, things are going to be okay.)

how'd's that sound?

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/117826587962/i-havent-slept-recently-so-dont-believe>

**Okay fine more about the babies** (set post-story)

I've had this in my head all day, like Bucky's home one morning working (like 2 weeks after he and Steve told Fury that they want to adopt) and he gets a call from Nick Fury who's like "are you home? stay there. I have babies for you" and bucky freaks out and calls Steve and says "K you can come home now?" and Steve's all "WTF we need more time" and Bucky's like "Too late for that, cowboy."

Then Nick shows up with another social worker and they bundle the twins (who are like, what, eight months old) into the house and Bucky's stuck staring at two babies who are crawling over each other and gumming up the furniture and Wanda, who's cutting her bottom teeth, is drooling on his shoulder and he's got heart eyes because babsies. There's paperwork and a quick check of the house, then Nick hands over a diaper bag and a backpack of their belongings and says "good luck, Sergeant" and Bucky's left with two babies.

Steve gets home an hour later to find Bucky on his stomach in a blanket fort (the only thing he could find to keep the babies in one place) and Steve's like What. How. Really? so Bucky dumps Wanda into his arms and says "Nick didn't leave any cigars." And Wanda bops Steve in the nose and drools on his best tie and once Steve gets over the massive shock, he's totally into it. (Pietro, in the meantime, has pulled himself to his feet and is toddling around, trying to find a way to make it over to the very curious doggy in the corner.)

Still, Bucky makes Steve go pick up Clint and Natasha from school to break the news, because he knows in his gut that Natasha is going to be furious at the disruption to her routine (without advance warning).

And then Bucky has to figure out how he's going to fit two baby car seats in the jeep and still manage to drive the kids and Steve around. And then a two-seater stroller. And jesus christ how can a one-armed man take care of twins? But it's great and everyone is happy and it's perfect and they live happily ever after the end.

(When Clint is up for his third Olympic gold medal in the 2032 Summer Games in Madrid, Natasha takes time off from her blockbuster movie career and joins up with Bucky and Steve and the twins, who are like 12 by this point, and it's the best family vacation ever. Also Clint only makes silver, but Kate scores golds so he's happy too)

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/117900141807/seriously-why-your-headcanons-are-always-son>

**Wherein teenage Bucky decides to join the Army** (set pre-series)

**Anonymous** asked:

> Kinda random HoC question, but you always have such wonderful characterization: I was wondering if you could go into Bucky's reasoning for joining the army instead of pursuing something else? I remember reading that he joined after 9/11 so I'm betting a sense of duty/patriotism played a part, but joining the army after such an obvious precursor to war doesn't seem like something pragmatic Bucky would do on a whim. Was there something that pushed him that way as opposed to college/something else?

you ask the interesting questions, anon. the first think you have to understand about how I'm writing Bucky in this story is to understand that every single thing he does, he does to keep himself from being vulnerable (which is slightly different than keeping himself safe). After what happened to him as a teenager, Bucky went through life making choices to keep himself from being dependent on anyone, and removing as much of his vulnerability as possible. Not only emotionally, although that's a large part of it, but also with regards to money.

That last, which is touched upon less in Hands of Clay but is still there, comes from that week of being on his own, with no change of clothes, nowhere to stay, and no place to get more money. Bucky made it through, but learned a very hard lesson in all that, which was that if he didn't have money or a way to make money on his own terms, he was vulnerable/in danger.

So when he graduated from high school, he never thought about going to college right away, because he had this idea that he could work for a while and save up enough money so he wouldn't have to take out student loans. He was too busy to make scholarships in high school, what with track and field as his extra-curricular and working as much as he could in the family's construction business on his off-hours. So it was in his mind to work for a year, save up, then see if he could get into the local community college. (Also, a note, all of the money from his father's life insurance and everything went to his mother as the sole beneficiary, with the understanding that she would assist the children, but Bucky was not going to be beholden to anyone for money, even his own mother. Because he remembers that while Bucky's father was the one who threw him out of the house, his mother waited until after Father Barnes was dead, before she went to bring her son home.

Then, after 9/11 (Bucky would have been about 19), he decided to join the Army as a way to make his future. He wasn't entirely sure about the Army as a career, but he read all the enlistment materials and what he would get out the other side of a successful run (access to money for school, health insurance), and the pay seemed fine, considering he didn't have any college. I always wrote Bucky as the kind of person who would enlist for a number of reasons, so the above, as well as the political repercussions after 9/11 (being a boy from Brooklyn, you see, he had a closer connection to what happened.

Also, coming back to the invulnerability part, Bucky figured that if he kept himself in the closet and safe in high school, he could just keep doing the same thing in the Army. A bit naively, Bucky thought that DADT just meant that he had to stay closeted and that if he did that, he was safe; obviously that wasn't (and in some places isn't) the way it went, but by that time he was embedded and knew how to read people and how to keep himself safe.

The physical work wasn't difficult for him; track and field kept him fast, construction work made him strong and both helped his endurance. He had spent a long time listening to orders and keeping his thoughts to himself.

When he headed off to boot camp, he didn't have anything back home to hold on to. His high school friends were all off to college or into the family business (and they weren't really all that close, which was a conscious decision on Bucky's part). His mother and his sister, well, he needed to get away from them. Steve had been gone from his life for seven years. So it was just Bucky, by himself, getting on that bus. He told himself that if he didn't die overseas (still a distant possibility to the mind of a 19-year-old boy) he'd come back and be able to pay for college and decide what he wanted to do, then.

So, an epic tl;dr later: Bucky joined the army for a lot of reasons, most of them having to do with his life-long need to keep himself from being vulnerable, because he learned the hard way that when you are vulnerable, the people you love will hurt you.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/119469163802/kinda-random-hoc-question-but-you-always-have>

**How Steve got from art school to head of philanthropy at Stark Industries** (set pre-series)

Steve Rogers met Tony Stark (I dunno, maybe Steve was interviewing for a small design job in Stark Industries and he leaves the interview and goes to the coffee shop and is walking out carrying his coffee, knowing he didn't make the grade and wondering again how he was going to make the rent, when something small and robotic runs into his legs and he trips and falls, managing to save from spilling coffee on his art portfolio only by taking the hit himself, staining his last good shirt on the way down.

"Well," Steve hears a voice say, "What do you have in that thing, your laptop?"

Steve looks up to see a goateed face on a man holding the demonic robot dog that had tripped Steve in the first place. "Not everything worthwhile has a power cord," Steve mutters, standing up. At least this happened after his interview. 

"Most of the quality shit runs on batteries, anyway." 

Steve glares at the man, and it takes him a minute to look past his wounded pride to realize that he's talking to Tony Stark. Tony. Stark. 

And because his mouth runs without needing input from his brain, Steve says, "Depends on how many horses you got under the hood."

Tony just rolls his eyes. "Spot," he says, addressing the robot dog, "You're useless. I should melt you down for scraps."

The dog whines.

Steve brushes off the seat of his pants as he heads over to a nearby railing. He's pretty sure he managed to keep the portfolio from being hit by the coffee, but better check here and salvage what he can.

Luckily, nothing got wet. Steve is smoothing the tissue paper back over an ink and charcoal sketch he did of Peggy a while back when the robot dog sticks its nose under his arm. He jumps.

"That's good," Tony Stark says. "If you like traditional."

"Traditional sells in job interviews," Steve says, and because he's always been a contrary son of a bitch, opens the portfolio to the pieces that he'd never show at a job interview. "Traditional pays the rent."

Tony cranes his neck this way and that, looking at the expressionist blobs on the paper. "That's–" he begins, then stops. He turns nearly all the way around to look at an angle. "That's the molecular structure of morphine."

Steve stares. Then, steading the piece as the robot dog tries to jump out of Tony's grip, he stares some more. "How did you see that?" Steve asks, because he's read a lot of things about Tony Stark, the playboy, the engineer, the rich asshole, but never that he was _perceptive_. Steve had drawn this piece one long week after he broke up with Peggy, in multicoloured crayola markers, layer on layer of tightly controlled lines. it didn't look like a chemical structure; it didn't look like anything but Steve's frustration and loss.

Instead of answering, Tony says, "Do you do portraits?"

"Are you offering me a job?"

"A commission." Tony shrugs. "I forgot someone's birthday. Come back next week. Eleventh floor, ask for Happy."

"But–" Steve begins, but Tony's vanishing down the hall and Steve is left holding his open portfolio, his shirt drying wet and stained against his chest.

What the hell, Steve thought, came back the following week to meet Happy (the bodyguard) and Ms. Pepper Potts, Tony's assistant, whose birthday was actually seven months away and who really didn't want a portrait, but arranged to buy a few of Steve's paintings for the office walls, and Steve was so grateful that he contacted a friend of a friend whose photos he knew from Flickr and arranged a photo session for Ms. Potts, who was far more keen on Peter Parker's photo skills than she had been on Steve's painting skills.

(Tony keeps trying to commission Steve to do portraits and no one wants their picture done, so Steve ends up painting city scapes and crowd scenes for the office walls, and Tony talks to him as he paints, and Steve bails Tony out of scrapes when Pepper can't, and talks him down from the walls when Pepper isn't there, and sometimes when she is, and Steve just is. And he doesn't judge Tony or try to get his money or into his pants and Tony is all _I do not compute_? is  <friend>Steve + Tony</friend>???? and Rhodey likes Steve too and Steve finally does get to paint that portrait, of Rhodey's parents for their 50th wedding anniversary and Rhodey's mother cries when she sees it and gives Steve a big hug and tells him that he's a nice boy while Rhodey's father just beams at his wife and tells Steve that he's got a good eye for the ladies.)

A couple years pass and and one thing led to another and being Tony Stark's friend has weird ways of opening doors, especially when the previous head of development at SI was found out have been embezzling from the Maria Stark Foundation for years. Everything that could be shaken up, was shook, and the first phone call Tony made after speaking with his lawyer and the DA, was to Steve.

Because Tony, who had grown up in Howard Stark's money and Howard Stark's shadow, knows very well that the one thing you cannot buy in this world, is trust. And Tony Stark trusts four people out of six billion not to fuck him over - Edwin Jarvis, Rhodey, Pepper Potts, and now Steve Rogers.

"Hey Steve," Tony says over the phone. It's three in the morning and Steve's making cranky noises. "I got a commission for you."

"Okay," Steve says sleepily, because it's been a few years and he knows that Tony Stark is not like other people, with their slavish adherence to time and sleep. "I'll be there at ten."

Only when Steve walks into the SI offices, ready with his sketchpad and his pencils, he finds that the FBI is still there and Pepper's looking worried but when she sees him, she hands him a sheaf of papers and says, "You are not going to believe what's happening now."

And in spite of years knowing Tony Stark, Steve does not believe. But what the hell, he's always been up for one of Tony's commissions. 

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/121157372097/howd-steve-get-from-art-school-to-philanthropy>

**A sidebar to look at Sam Wilson who is awesome** (set post-story)

After HoC ends, Steve runs into Sam again and it's awkward but also kind of fun catching up and the long and short of it is that Steve ends up saying that he has tickets to a horse show at which his friend Thor (crown prince of Denmark) is competing, and Steve can't go because he's taking Clint to an archery competition so maybe if Sam wants them?

And Sam does want them because he grew up close to a stable and loves horses (shut up) and Steve knows this (no seriously _shut up_ ) so you bet he takes the ticket and it's like VIP access to the show and would you look at that food and hey open bar and Thor, who is there in all his splendid being, remembers Sam from when he and Steve were dating and is all big and booming and introduces Sam around like Sam's some kind of VIP, and Jane Foster is there with her best friend Darcy and there's all the schmoozing and then into the VIP suite walks the most gorgeous woman Sam has ever seen, like ever, and she goes right up to Thor and they converse in Danish and Sam's all O_O and then the woman leaves without a glance around and Sam asks Darcy, "So, who?"

And Darcy, who is multilingual and speaks, among others, Awestruck, says, "That's Thor's head trainer, Sif."

And Sam's new mission in life is to meet Sif so anyway the show happens and Thor's horses perform beautifully and afterwards there are awards and champagne and Sif's standing there, sort of stiff and uncomfortable as she feels far better with horses than people (well, Thor's okay but he's _Thor_ ) and Sam comes up and says "Hey" and Sif says "Hey" and wants to leave because she knows what happens when handsome men want to talk to her, it is never because of _her_ , and then Sam says "I have never seem a more comfortable looking horse in the ring, that was _fantastic_ " and all of a sudden he has Sif's _attention_. 

And that, as they say, is the start of a beautiful friendship :D

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/121161302297/does-sam-end-up-with-anyone-in-the-hoc-verse>

**So where are the Howling Commandos in all of this?**

The Howling Commandos are part of Bucky's old unit in Iraq (international coalition and all that). I know they'd all be fine with Bucky being gay, Bucky just wasn't every sure and it was safer than sorry.

I had an idea that in a year or two Bucky runs into Morita, who's in town, and they exchange small talk and Bucky shows Morita a few pics of Natasha, and Jim's like hey you should come to a get-together we're having in California next month, the guys from the crew and their families. And then Bucky's like "fuck this shit" and says do you think everyone would be okay if I brought my boyfriend and his son.

And Jim doesn't even miss a beat and says they better fucking be, you know these guys they'll be fine. Then, got any pics of this guy?

And later when Jim is relating this story to his wife back home, he says seriously, Barnes went out and found a goddamn supermodel or something, his photo is unreal.

And Jim's wife says Good, I could use some eye candy after staring at your mug all day. When are you coming home?

Two days, sweetheart, Jim says, grinning at the phone. Put the baby on, will you?

Tl'dr: everything goes fine with that crew and Natasha charms everyone and so does Steve and Clint gets a crush on Gabe's girlfriend and follows her around with heart-eyes. And that night Steve says to Bucky, see that went well and Bucky says yeah, with these guys. I still made the right call, not telling anyone. And Steve says why not and Bucky says because a thousand guys couldn't give a fuck what I am, but all it would take was one asshole with a grudge to get me kicked out. And Steve can't say anything to that except to give Bucky a big hug because he's right and DADT fucking sucked.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/121227214207/how-would-the-howlies-who-im-assuming-are-in>

**Steve's childhood before he was adopted and what he wants for Clint**

Steve's childhood was pretty sparse. He was in the system from five to twelve, in the same foster home between seven and twelve but it never felt like home, too many kids and Steve living in hopes of a real family instead of the half attention he got at the foster home, mostly when he was being bad. They had Christmas and all that but Steve saw what the other kids had, what Bucky had (and Bucky's family was pretty well off, all told, and Bucky got nice Christmas and birthday presents and all around had a lot of stuff and Steve equated having stuff with being happy, mostly because he didn't have a lot). Steve also loved to read and he got this idealized vision of what a happy childhood was like, with lots of celebrations and family outings and sports lessons and music lessons and lots of hugs and love and Steve used to think that, if his mother hadn't died, he'd have had all that with her. (And he probably would have.)

And then, too, after he was adopted, Steve saw what the Erskines had as a family life and included that into his dream of what a childhood would have been.

School was okay, but Steve was only really interested in reading and drawing and playing with Bucky, and the teachers were (to Steve) not memorable, not bad but not what he saw in books or in TV.

So with Clint, and the associated guilt Steve has about Sharon being out of the picture (although they all agreed it was best for everyone that way), Steve's hyper sensitive to trying to give Clint this idealized childhood.

Only it's not working out like Steve imagined that because life is tricky. Clint isn't into team sports and music lessons aren't on the books with Clint's hearing loss. But Clint loves swimming and he loves ( _loves_ ) archery and he and his dad go to museums and the park and Clint always has a super birthday because birthdays are _awesome_ , and he gets Hanukkah at Grandpa Abraham's house _and_ Christmas with his dad and now Clint has a best friend who is the _best_ , and Skye who's teaching him to read and lets him draw with _all_ the colors, and James who's super cool and has a fake arm like Clint has a fake ear, and there are story books Clint can see and make up the words to, and there are _dogs_ in the world, and _cats_ , and there's _candy_ , and every night when Clint goes to sleep he's happy (except he misses his mother but that's a constant thing, and he knows that she'll come back some day).

So really, what Steve wanted for Clint, what he didn't have, was a happy childhood, and it's working out okay.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/121228577887/what-was-steves-childhood-like-he-wants-to-raise>

**Summertime in the city is too damned hot**

it's hot where I am so anyway here are some [**Hands of Clay**](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=http%3A%2F%2Farchiveofourown.org%2Fworks%2F2143266%2Fchapters%2F4682211&t=MDBmOTJlNTA2OGI4MmIzZWZhYmFhZDhkZTViY2FjMDUwMDhhYmFlYSxrS05MQXZQSA%3D%3D) head canons about how the folks deal with the New York summer heatwaves:

  * Clint's fine with the heat during the day, only he gets cranky when it's too hot at bed time. The main apartment room has AC so on really hot nights Clint sleeps on the couch, taking up all the AC. Steve budgets for a higher electricity bill.
  * Natasha is very particular when she's too hot - in her baby/toddler years this resulted in some epic tantrums because she felt so uncomfortable. She learned at a very young age tho that hot = dad gets her popsicles or cold water or a cool bath, which in turn makes her happy, so she just goes with it. 
  * Bucky, who brought Nat home in the middle of the summer, and her so tiny and frail, spends an inordinate amount of time worrying about Natasha being too hot or too cold (like what does he know about babies' ability to regulate temperature?) so in her early years, he had a tendency to hover and check in more times than he needs to at night, to make sure the room wasn't too hot.
    * on the times they had brown-outs in heat waves, they slept in the basement where it was nice and cool. 
  * Bucky likes to say that he has asbestos skin, after spending so long in Afghanistan and Iraq he isn't bothered by temperature any more. That's a lie, of course; his prosthetic arm rubs and chafes when it's too hot and he sweats, and his scars ache more with hot than cold (tho he's pretty sure that's psychosomatic and never tells his docs). When it's really hot out, he spends as much time as he can with his prosthesis off and takes three cold showers a day. 
  * Steve got bad heatstroke when he was fifteen and out at a school volunteer event; luckily, Abraham saw what was wrong as soon as he went to pick Steve up, and drove as fast as he could to the hospital. Ever since, Steve is very conscious of the temperature forecast and of ensuring that he's got enough liquids and shelter time. He never talks about it.



Anyway that's what I've got.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/122635951652/its-hot-where-i-am-so-anyway-here-are-some-hands>

**Toddler Natasha learns a new phrase AKA Salt n Vinegar** (set pre-series)

so I had this idea about when Natasha was just two, the cutest little toddler you ever did see, but also a little girl with the energy of eleven five-year-old boys. So one day, when she's being particularly persnickety, James blurts out in frustration "you're just full of piss and vinegar today, aren't you?" to which lil!Nat says "Yea!", jumps out of the bathtub, and runs screaming down the hallway dripping water and suds.

Of course, Natasha picks up on this language and is smart enough to make the connection with how she was feeling, so a few days later when she's frustrated with her father and also she has buzzies in her tummy and her juice tasted weird and she wants to jump around, she pulls off her shirt, throws it to the ground, and announces proudly her state of mind. Only she gets it wrong, and that leaves James faced with a toddler jumping up and down, declaring in her high-pitched squeaky voice that she is " _Salt and Vinegar! Salt and Vinegar!_ " while Bucky dies of laughter on the hallway floor. 

Then, of course, Bucky is in the store one day and sees salt and vinegar chips and buys a bag to see what Natasha thinks of them; Natasha puts one in her mouth and gets this _face_ , like she and six generations of her Russian ancestors have been _betrayed_.

She then spits her entire mouthful onto Bucky's bare feet and that is officially the last time Bucky tries to trick Natasha into tasting anything weird.

(she still uses _salt and vinegar_ to describe her cranky moods these days, but only sparingly because she's five years old now, nearly a grown-up, and that was a thing she said when she was a baby. So don't tell Clint.)

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/125556263761/so-i-had-this-idea-about-hands-of-claynat-when>

**A bit of meta on James' father AND also some fluff on Wanda and Pietro making friends with baby Vision**

**Anonymous** asked:

> Hi! I love your work in hands of clay, and hope to some day write children characters as well as(and as loveable as baby Clint and baby Nat are) portrayed in the fic. I do have two questions. Did Bucky's dad ever regret how he treated his son? Also after reading about Steve and Bucky adopting Wanda and Pietro, would they make any friends like baby Vision for example?

okay question time.

The question about Bucky's dad is a hard one, partly because what happened with them happened in real life back then, and it still happens _now_. I had the idea that Bucky's dad was a bit older, so born just before or after the end of WWII, 1945-ish, so he was coming of age in the late 60s/early 70s. Came from a bit of a conservative family, working construction in Brooklyn, going to church and stuff like that. Then the 80s hits, and the AIDS epidemic is suddenly making news (here is a[ good timeline](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.aids.gov%2Fhiv-aids-basics%2Fhiv-aids-101%2Faids-timeline%2F&t=OTk1NzQwZWM3OTY1ZmJkNDE1NGQxMjk3OWVlNzczNDFhYzAzMjgwNix1QVlWVnFUdg%3D%3D)). I don't know if you were around back then, anon, but people freaked the fuck _out_ about AIDS. All that stuff about people thinking you could get AIDS from sharing a drinking fountain, or a toilet seat, that stuff was real. And the reason I'm bringing that into this is that a lot of people thought that AIDS was a gay disease, and that could morph into thinking that anyone who was gay would get AIDS and that a "gay lifestyle" would kill someone. 

So that, on top of certain religious and social opinions on homosexuality (that god hates gay people, that a gay man isn't a real man and all that bullshit), can focus on vilifying the concept of homosexuality over the whole person, throwing the actual person under the bus as you object to the concept. And Bucky's father was never shy about voicing his opinion on the way of life (and that thing in chapter 20 where Steve mentioned that he remembered Bucky's dad's opinion on guys like him). 

So Bucky's father, with all this stuff behind him, didn't hear the part where Bucky said he needed help that day; he heard his fifteen year old son saying that he was gay and that he was involved with a man and he just flipped out. To him, Bucky was purposefully throwing everything he and Bucky's mother did for him in raising him and keeping a roof over his head etc, back in their faces, He quite literally was unable to hear Bucky asking him for help. So he freaked out, kicked Bucky out of the house, and told his wife that Bucky wasn't ever to set foot back in his house until he changed his perverted ways. 

And before he died, he wasn't able to untangle that sense of losing Bucky from the way he'd treated him, to feeling like he had literally lost his son when he found out that Bucky was gay. Like this was Bucky's fault, not his, because Bucky was the one who was gay and thrown away everything his parents did for him.

Had the father lived through the construction accident, he might have come around in a few months, but I don't think he'd have let Bucky come back home quite so quickly (here are some [good stats on teen homelessness and has some breakdowns for LGTB youth](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.dosomething.org%2Ffacts%2F11-facts-about-homeless-teens&t=M2ZiZDk4MTA3YTlkMjc4NzEzMDI5ZmM3ZWI1N2VjYTA5ZDk2MDIyYix1QVlWVnFUdg%3D%3D)) and I shudder to think what that would have meant for Bucky.

Okay that's a depressing fictional look at the realities still facing some of today's young people. Love your kids, everyone, that's all I've got on that.

Let's have a short break and a change of subject:

The babies! Yes Wanda and Pietro will make good friends with baby Vision. Only see it's the first summer after they were adopted, and Bucky is convinced that it's a _great idea_ to take the babies on the Barnes-Rogers annual vacation to the Stark beach house, so they load up in the car and all six of them (well, seven with teh dog) and trundle off to Long Island. And it's actually good timing because at the same time, Lucy's daughter is visiting (so I had the idea that Lucy was about 10 years older than Tony, and her kids are about 25-30 now) and brought with her the first Jarvis great-grandbaby - Victor (one of Vision's aliases in the Marvel universe was Victor Shade).

So it's the day after they get there and Bucky has baby Wanda and baby Pietro in the splash pool in little baby floats (and he's not even blinking he's so paranoid about something happening why did he think this was a good idea Steve why didn't you stop me when I suggested this) when Lucy's daughter comes out with her baby, and since more adult eyes the better they just put baby Victor into the pool with Wanda and Pietro and while Pietro is intent on making his escape to play with the dog, Wanda is _fascinated_ by the baby (the twins are close to a year old at this point, while baby Victor is maybe what, six months?) and she keeps trying to say his name but she can only get to "Vis-ah!" and oh isn't that cute but yeah she's a big fan of the baby.

Natasha likes baby Victor because he's not mobile, and that means Wanda will stay close by, and Pietro doesn't like to let Wanda out of his sight no matter how far he toddles, so it makes life easier for them. 

Clint likes baby Victor because his mother is teaching him baby-sign, and Clint and him have conversations (that are usually 'milk' and 'mommy' but still Clint is talking to a baby and that's _cool_ ).

The dog likes the baby because Wanda keeps handing him animal crackers, and the baby drops them so the dog can eat them.

anyway that's what happens there :)

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/126874067632/hi-i-love-your-work-in-hands-of-clay-and-hope-to>

**How Clint got into archery and how Natasha discovered karate/ballet** (set pre-series)

1\. Back when Clint was in preschool, he and Steve were at a state fair or something in New Jersey on a visit to Abraham, and this was during the early days of the Hunger Games movies. There was an archery showcase and Clint just _stopped_. Refused to look away, refused to move, hardly even breathing. After the demonstration was over, Clint dragged Steve over to look at the _cool big kids, daddy!_ and to touch the bows and the arrows _carefully, Clint,_ and it was all Clint talked about for days until Steve finally broke under the barrage and looked up archery ranges in the city that did kids' lessons.

And when Clint got to hold a bow for the first time, and shoot his very first arrow, he was so excited he vibrated with glee all the way home. And to Steve's surprise (but not Clint's, because he knew he'd be great in that way that only four year olds can), Clint was actually really good. 

So a) enthusiasm, b) natural born skill, and c) lots of hard work. And Steve's unwavering support helps a lot.

2\. For Nat, ballet was one of those things that James got her into as kindergarten started because he didn't know what else to do with her around physical activity. He always thought Natasha was too small at 4.5 years old for contact sports like soccer, and ballet seemed like something she could do and not get crushed by the competition. Natasha just liked dancing around to the music.

Karate, however, she discovered on the day that [Clint took Steve and Bucky to a baseball game](http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/102566430682/sotto-accorgersi-replied-to-your-post-writing-the). She was with Maria and she got to see a cool demonstration and then she asked Maria if one day, she (Natasha I mean) could do those things, and Maria said, "Sure. I can" and Natasha's hero worship went strait up to eleven on that one, because Maria is _everything_ and if Maria can do karate, then Natasha wants to do it too!

So (eventually when school starts) Bucky enrols Natasha in karate class and he's still worried about how small she is, but Natasha is dedicated and giving it 110% and she finds that it's just like dancing only more interactive and in a few years she'll realize that it's like playing chess (only potentially violent) and she enjoys the mental aspect of it as well. 

(Plus, she just _destroys_ all the boys she gets pitted against who think because she's such a little girl, she's not a threat)

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/128230789007/selkieinthesea-replied-to-your-postthe-new-tumblr>

**Halloween!** (set in the October of the HoC year ie upcoming)

  * Natasha wants to go as a princess (this is not a surprise), but at the last minute she decided that she wanted to be a _pirate_ princess.
  * So Bucky, in a fit of mad inspiration, decides he's going to have a costume all his own. Steve nearly faints when Bucky swaggers down the stairs dressed as a one-armed Pirate King. In leather pants.
  * Steve is dressed as the Scarecrow from Wizard of Oz, because Clint wanted to go as the Tin Man but then changed his mind.
  * Clint ended up going as a zombie mummy. 
    * He really did want to go as Robin Hood, but Steve vetoed Clint being able to carry his real bow so Clint huffed and puffed and said _okay_.
  * Three jack o'lanterns on the porch, one carved by Nat, one by Clint, and one a joint effort by Steve and Bucky because "Otherwise it's cheating, Daddy, because you're _old._ " Everyone agrees that Nat and Clint's pumpkins are the best.
  * They do go trick or treating. The adults swap out in staying home to hand out candy, which gives the kids a chance to dump their pillowcases out for a second round. 
  * People think Bucky's costume is super cool, until they realize that he really is missing an arm. Then all the kids are like, SO COOL and the parents are weirded out and Bucky grits his teeth and goes with it because he chose this damned costume. 
    * Natasha is just so deliriously happy that she and her father have matching costumes that it makes it worth it, to Bucky.
  * At the end of the night, when all the Trick-or-Treaters are gone and the jack o'lanterns extinguished, everyone sits sorting through candy and the kids exchanging their candy so everyone gets their best-favorites. 
    * Bucky and Steve end up with the licorice and the tootsie rolls and the tooth brush and the erasers.
    * After the kids are _finally_ in bed, Bucky finds Steve sneaking a Butterfingers out of Clint's candy bag and is _shocked, honestly Steve, really? Stealing candy from your own child?_
    * _Bucky, you have one of Natasha's Mars Bars **in your mouth**._



<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/132313054722/tell-me-about-halloween-and-hands-of-clay-does>

**So what about Christmas and Hanukkah?** (also lots about Grandpa Abraham)

For Nat and Bucky, well, Bucky's been trying to balance the whimsy and spirit of the holidays with trying to keep Natasha away from the idea that it's okay for strange men with large sacks to enter the house unawares. 

She has some vague idea that the mall Santas are Corporal Santas,who report up to the Sergeant Santa who coordinates and plans details of all the gift delivery in the entire _country_ , with the head Colonel Santa being some benevolent overlord who is the one who sees all the children in the whole wide world who are naughty and nice and who makes sure they get their gifts (and if this top Santa resembles Nick Fury and the Sergeant Santa is like her daddy, well, that can all be laid at Nick Fury's feet from a story he told little Natasha one Christmas past when she kept asking, "Why?").

But Clint and Steve, oh, now that's a different story, one that starts back in the late 1970s with Abraham and Marta in their first Christmas in the States after they defected from East Germany. As with a lot of people who grew up under Communism, Marta and Abraham weren't religious, but Abraham also had a complicated relationship with his family and personal history as a Jewish man growing up in East Germany. Anyway they land in New Jersey and Marta is pregnant and 100% determined to leave Communism behind, and that means taking part in all American rituals with their excessive overconsumption and exaggerated ritual. For Christmas she's set on having a tree and decorations and all the everything, and then Abraham's walking out in the neighbourhood one night and he sees a menorah in a window, and he starts to think. 

The next year, with Sally teething in her high chair and Marta cooking Thanksgiving dinner, Abraham tells Marta that he thinks, that year, they might celebrate Hanukkah too. It's a process, for Abraham, and anyway it takes a while but over the years, the family ends up celebrating Christmas as a secular holiday and parts of the Hanukkah observances. And the girls grow up like that, and after Marta dies and after Abraham adopts little 12-year-old Steve straight out of the foster care system, Abraham is determined to give Steve the Christmas he thinks Steve would want (Kimberly and Sally have _ideas_ about Christmas and what Steve needs, he's like a little puppy) but he also does what he always does with Hanukkah, and Steve is like a little sponge and soaks everything up and loves everything his new family does because Steve has a heart ten times bigger than his entire body.

So years later, when Clint is a lil baby and Steve is trying to figure out what to do with raising a son, Steve asks Abraham what he should say about Santa and all that. Abraham says that Steve should do what Abraham and Marta did, which was to have the family gathering at Hanukkah and then presents, trees and Santa at Christmas, and then Clint throws the aluminum foil at the cat (we don't even _have_ a cat!) and the moment is lost. 

But that's how Clint came to know that every year, he and his daddy go to Grandpa Abraham's for Hanukkah and they see the family and it's so great because there are _lights_ and _food_ and Clint _loves_ food and staying up after dark and he loves his _whole family_ (even his cousins, Peter who is 3 years older than him and maybe kinda mean, and Pammie, who is 6 months younger and is a _baby_ ) and getting to see them is the best. The _best_. And then later, it's Christmas, where there are presents and Santa and his Daddy is always there for awesome fun times. 

And this year is the best because Clint is going to buy a present for Natasha for Christmas _all by himself_ (okay maybe his daddy gave him a money or ten) and she's going to like it and also Santa will come and maybe (just maybe) Clint will get that super-cool arm-guard and the glove he can use to fire his bow, and also a Superman backpack and maybe some kitchen utensils ( _real_ utensils, not those pretend things they give to _babies_ ) so Clint can make for himself a real pizza that he can eat _all by himself_ and maybe (maybe) share with Natasha.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/135959057682/i-cant-believe-i-didnt-think-to-ask-this-before>

**How many Situation Codes do James and Natasha have?**

Previously encountered in [Hands of Clay](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2143266/chapters/4682211):

**Situation India:** it's important to freeze and listen to your dad. (that one Bucky got from the phonetic alphabet off "important" - he was at a loss for an "I" word)

**Situation Elephant:** It's an emergency and we need to leave this place **_now_**.

**Situation Rainbow** : Time to refresh and restart and calm down (with rainbow yoga)

**Situation Cheetah** : Hurry hurry hurry! (but in a fun way)

and then the others:

**Situation Sparkles** : Shake out your sillies! (worked better when Nat was 3; now at 5 she is "too old" to be silly.)

**Situation Fury** : Named after Nick Fury, not the emotion, this is the most dire of James' instructions to Natasha. If he uses this one, Natasha knows to run away and hide as fast as she can, and call Nick as soon as she can (she memorized his phone number at the same time she memorized her father's). James is taking no changes on his little girl's safety if something happens to him and he can't protect her.

And on a lighter note:

**Situation Octopus** : Lots of stuff is happening, so make sure to hold dad's hand really tight!

And **Situation Cupcake** : smile and cheer up, sweet pea, things are going to be okay (when Nat is sad sometimes).

Not to be outdone, Natasha has created her own code words for her father. 

It started out with **Situation Potato** , because ‘potato' sounded like ‘potty' when said by a two-year-old and this is when Natasha needs to use the bathroom _now please_ and James knows to pick her up and _hurry_.

Then there was **Situation Monkey** , when Natasha needs emergency hugs just like a baby monkey.

And she tried to implement **Situation Popsicle** for when she needs emergency popsicles or ice cream, but her dad never falls for that one.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/136915351657/how-many-situation-codes-do-james-and-natasha>

**Five birthdays** (set pre-series)

1\. by Natasha's first birthday, she was strong enough to sit up and pull herself along a little (not crawling but she could roll like a champion) so James put her little diapered butt on a tarp in the back yard and gave her a cupcake to eat. She ended up with icing all over her front and cupcake crumbs everywhere and James laughed so hard he cried. Then he cried some more at bath time (you try getting mashed up cake crumbs out of a baby's ear)

2\. On Clint's second birthday, Steve took him to work at Stark Tower, where Tony and Bruce had made a foot-high kid-proof robot for Clint. Steve was a bit freaked out, but Clint loved his little toy. Then everyone turned their backs for five seconds to get the cake ready and Clint _vanished_. It took half the building staff over an hour to find Clint having a nap _underneath_ one of Tony's tool cabinets. Steve didn't let Clint out of his sight for a week and Tony still gets jumpy when he's alone with the kid (blames himself).

Also the little robot toy was a huge hit in stores that Christmas

3\. For Nat's third birthday, James took her and Maria out for high tea at one of them fancy hotels in Manhattan (Maria came along because James needed birthday backup). Natasha was very impressed with all the "princesses" who were there (rich ladies and stuff) and made friends with the waiter (Jeffrey) and upended an entire cup of milky tea over her dress. One of the neighboring ladies looked horrified but James didn't know why, the dress was machine washable. Maria had a blast and Natasha giggled all the way home. James blamed a sugar high.

4\. For Clint's fourth birthday, he was so bummed that his mother wasn't there that he didn't want to do anything, so Steve, desperate, bundled Clint up and they took the train into the city and went to Central Park, where they went on the _carousel - four times!_ and Clint had a _whole hot dog_ , and he saw a magician do _magic,_ and they went to the zoo and Clint got to see _birds_ and then they went to Uncle Tony's and they had pizza and Uncle Tony made funny faces and it was Clint's best birthday ever.

5\. James hadn't celebrated his birthday since he was fifteen. At sixteen, his father was dead, his mother kept trying to pretend James was "normal" but didn't seem all that supportive of James spending any time around his male friends, so James spent the day doing homework and pretending to not care he didn't get any presents.

Seventeen was the same. At eighteen, James spent the day at work on a construction site and got home at eleven and no one had even left any food from dinner so James ate two pieces of stale bread and fell into bed and wondered if everything was always going to be so empty and what was the point anymore.

At nineteen, he was in basic training and no one cared about his goddamned birthday and he hadn't been so happy since before Steve left.

When Natasha was three, she asked him when he ate his birthday cake and he said he didn't have birthdays any more, he was too old, and she was young enough to not question that.

(you can bet your buttons that Steve's going to find out about all this, come March, and he is going to have _feelings_ about Bucky's birthday ~~and most of those feelings will be anger~~ )

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/137195454102/still-fighting-with-hands-of-clay-and-another-day>

**And following up on that ^^: some meta on James' life as a teenager with discussion around depression and isolation**

**Anonymous** asked:

> Sorry about the long work day:( I read the hoc birthday post (why would you do that it's so sad:'() and I wondered after the 18th b-day bit - did James ever think about suicide, when he was younger? I know that survival is such a huge part of his self-worth, but being so young and so overwhelmed and depressed makes a mark on people. Was it ever even an idle thought?

_k so discussion of depression and mental health issues among fictional characters; also a discussion of how the real life events of 9/11 have influenced this story. and this got long so the rest is under the cut_

as a teenager, James' life was flat and he didn't see a heck of a lot of hope or potential for a future. He did okay in school but he wasn't from a family for whom college was a given, and he didn't really see what a college education would do for him… because he didn't see what the point in a future was.

(I want to go off on a tangent here that James wasn't seeing this only as a life separated from romantic attachment (tho that was part of it) - he had isolated himself so much from any friendships in high school to protect himself from further ostracization (he had enough of that at home) that nothing felt _real_ , by senior year. Teenage boys (like all teenagers tbh) may be still developing intellectually but they have that visceral understanding of when someone is lying to them, and as James went through high school he drifted further away from any real chance at friendship. He told himself that it was better than any of his friends pushing him away when they found out he was gay, but really, he ended up alone anyway)

What James _needed_ was a good counsellor and some actual goddamned support, but what he got was a roof over his head and a high school diploma and nothing else. So after he graduated, he went to work at the company his family used to own and came home and read books and went for walks and absolutely nothing he did had any point. 

He never seriously considered suicide; but there is sometimes a fine line between wanting to die, and not seeing any point in living. 

But the thing about Bucky Banes in any universe is that he's a survivor. 

He was always scrupulous about safety on the job, his and the other guys', and he loved figuring out the puzzles of working construction with his mind making connections and moving forward (the kinds of puzzles that make him so great in the Rangers and at security). He may not be able to see any future in the front of his brain, but he's alive and he's young and he's yearning for something different, something where he can excel. 

And then, as this AU incorporates part of the real world, 9/11.

James was horrified and sick about what happened; living in Brooklyn across the river from the Twin Towers, and he was from a class of people who were heavily represented in the firefighters and police of New York. What happened in 9/11 hit down to the bone for James and a lot of young men like him. But also, James was a pragmatist, and the idea of a career in the military (which tbh hadn't been on the radar much) was suddenly not a bad idea. Because it was chance at something new, something that would be all _his_ (his father missed the Vietnam draft due to crappy vision). 

So he enlisted and he went off to Army basic training at Fort Benning in Georgia and he really didn't know what to expect (like, he'd seen MASH and Private Benjamin?) but the thing about spending years pretending to be a) straight and b) "normal" is that he could go into basic training and not let the immersion part of basic training make much impact on him. He had a lot of practice at pretending to follow social norms while still being himself within his own head. Not to say he was isolated during basic: he was able to stretch his skills, physical and intellectual, in ways he never expected. And while he didn't get that chance to make any real emotional connections with his fellow enlistees, they were all in the same (unfamiliar) boat.

And finally, James had an idea that he might have a future after all.

He still had bouts of flatness and emotional detachments; that scene in HOC where James described going to Disneyland between deployments and having that dissociation from the "real" people, that's a thing, but also James doesn't have a lot of real connections with the world. He was a great sniper and forward scout, but he never really made a lot of connections with the men in his Ranger unit - there was a lot of that fear of losing his career if he was outed as gay under DADT. But compared with his teen years, in the Army James was building skills and connections, and when the worst came about in the explosion that blew his arm off, he never got back to that place of flat purposeless - he was a grown man with skills and experience and he'd be able to make his own way.

That's not to say that the loneliness can't be overwhelming, sometimes, but what James discovered in joining the Army and getting away from Brooklyn for a while, is that he had the ability to make his own way, his own choices, and he decided he was going to create his own future. 

Anyway, this has wandered far from your point, anon, but what I'm trying to get at is the isolation and flatness James was experiencing as a teenager, he found his way to looking forward to a future he chose for himself, in the absence of love and support from anyone. That's why he's so determined never to be beholden to anyone to keep himself (and by extension Natasha) safe; because he's been in that position before, and it nearly killed him.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/137230069497/sorry-about-the-long-work-day-i-read-the-hoc>

**Natasha versus Cheese Appreciation Day**

Natasha loses her _mind_ over National Cheese Lovers Day. She learns about it in school, and upon her return home she demands ( _demands_!) that they have a cheese appreciation dinner! So James capitulates (what the heck, they have all kinds of cheese over the house) and they end up having a cheese platter 

[[image](http://www.foodandnutrition.org/Stone-Soup/March-2013/The-Flavor-Factor-Teaching-Kids-to-Eat-Right/) [source](http://www.foodandnutrition.org/Stone-Soup/March-2013/The-Flavor-Factor-Teaching-Kids-to-Eat-Right/)]

and mac and cheese with bacon

[[image source](http://www.theslowroasteditalian.com/2011/09/super-simple-mac-cheese-italian-style.html) and recipe]

and of course cheesecake for dessert - cheesecake cupcakes

[[image source and recipe](http://www.bettycrocker.com/recipes/cheesecake-cupcakes/5905229f-4949-438f-9442-d2b9af76c5f8)]

By the time they're done Natasha can't eat any more cheese (a literal first for her) and Clint is in a food coma and Steve (who had like five bites) gets up to make a salad to cleanse his arteries. 

It was, Natasha later told her dad when he was tucking her in, the best night of her _life_. 

Later, Disneyland will sneak in a very close first, but for now it's the _best_.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/137732061817/according-to-the-stupid-facebook-trending-news>

**Steve's romantic relationships before Bucky**

Steve and dating: I think it's obvious that Steve has a type: lanky brunettes with wicked jaws. We know where he's at now (was in love but it didn't work out with Peggy; head over heels with James), but back when he was starting out, well, he had crushes on boys in high school but here's the thing, sometimes a kid knows what it's like living in a small town in New Jersey, sometimes you need to keep things to yourself, because even though teen!Steve knew Abraham wouldn't care if he started dating a boy - high school is rough and high school in the 90s wasn't exactly a bastion of understanding and acceptance. So in high school Steve dated girls because girls are awesome and they kinda liked him too, and Steve secretly also crushed on boys and that was that.

Then Steve went to college and whoo boy. Or, rather, whoo, _boys_. Like not at once, actually going to school was a lot, but eventually Steve went on a date? with a boy? and it wasn't terrible? and he also dated a few girls and a few more boys and it was nice and then exams came and Steve stopped doing anything but studying for a while because he was on scholarship and he didn't want to flunk out. And this was his first year, just casual things, then home for the summer then back to school and that's when everything changed.

That's when Steve met Thor Odinson.

Not like that; no, Thor was all about the ladies, but he and Steve totally hit it off at the gym (so, so bro) and they hung out and Thor was all about learning American culture and he loved American magazines for women ( _if I wish to date American women, I must learn what they are interested in, yes?_ and Steve can't say no) so one night in Thor's dorm he's reading Cosmo and he surreptitiously flips to the part on blow jobs and of course Thor sees and, calm as a Danish cucumber, tells Steve that there's a more accurate article in Playgirl and also if Steve was gay there was a hot male TA in Thor's French class and did he want an introduction?

After they sorted out the gay vs bi part, Steve took up Thor's offer on setting him up with the French TA (smoking hot, 21, and dark hair and eyes and maybe Steve _imprinted like a little duckling_ ) and they dated for like four months which is forever when you're 19 and Thor keeps trying to set him up with hot dudes.

Then Steve goes on exchange to England and meets Peggy Carter and falls _hard_.

Eventually, when they break it off and Steve comes back to the States, he's reluctant to start dating again, and when Sharon comes around that's okay because they're friends and he likes her but doesn't love her, and knows damned well she doesn't love him at all so they just bang.

Steve's just about to start thinking of getting back into the dating scene for real when the whole Clint thing happens. So instead of dating, Steve's freaking out impending fatherhood.

Then that stuff happens and eventually Sharon exits the lives of the Rogers' boys. Steve finds it hard to date, still, but he has a fling with [Bernie Rosenthal](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=http%3A%2F%2Fmarvel.wikia.com%2Fwiki%2FBernadette_Rosenthal_%2528Earth-616%2529&t=NGFjYzg5ZjQ4ODZkNzI3YzA3ZGE2ZjU5NmQwNzdhNDg2MTg1YmQxMCxkQnd2NGVhRg%3D%3D) and then he gets into a serious relationship with Sam Wilson (only as we went into earlier in the story, Sam was at a different place than Steve and they eventually ended it)

Then a five-year-old redhead shot Steve in the face with a nerf gun and Steve's whole life changed.

so that is the story of Steve Rogers' dating history, give or take.

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/139762721357/hi-thanks-so-much-for-writing-hands-of-clay-its>

**OMG Clint gets a dog!** (set post-series)

one spring day when the kids are both 8 ~~before the wedding~~ Steve's taken Nat into the city for an art show, and Bucky takes Clint to the farmer's market and there's an Adopt-A-Dog event nearby that Clint sees a flyer for (are those a thing? maybe those are a thing) and Bucky's all "Sure, what can the harm be?"

and so they go over and Bucky thinks Clint will want to look at any puppies, but instead Clint parks himself in front of this lovely golden retriever ("Only four years old!" exclaims the nearby attendant, shoving a flyer into Bucky's hand) and won't move. 

"Look, his name is Lucky," Clint says, pointing at the paper pinned to the leash. "He's quiet. And he likes kids."

"Yeah?" Bucky says, starting to hyperventilate. This can't be happening. Clint's never the one to try to pull shit on them in the stores, throwing tantrums about stuff he wants. Natasha has that market cornered.

Clint pats the dog's head, and the dog looks up at Clint with what looks like adoration (not that Bucky knows shit about dogs). "It says he needs a big yard," Clint goes on, making huge sad anime eyes at James. 

"So?"

"So _**we**_ have a big yard."

This goes on for an hour. In this hour, Bucky learns that the dog was turned over to the SPCA when his owner (an older man, a widower who adopted the dog after his wife died) had to go into a nursing home and he was so worried about his dog and even though Lucky was a well-behaved dog, Golden Retrievers needed a lot of attention and exercise and it wouldn't quite work out for folks in a small apartment, which is why Lucky hasn't been adopted yet.

and here Clint promises solemnly that he will walk Lucky every day, all by himself, and he'll clean up after the dog and feed him and brush him and read him stories and love him **_so_** much. 

And Bucky knows, he **_knows_** he should clear this with Steve first, but Bucky's whole life has been a story about adoption and second chances, goddamnit, and then the lady unties Lucky's leash and hands it to Clint and suggests they go for a walk around the park to "see how things go" and Clint's in _**love**_.

"There's no fee for adopting adult dogs," she calls after them as they walk away with the dog, and Bucky knows he's toast.

Steve is going to **_kill_** him. 

* * *

Much later, when Steve and Natasha get home from the art show, Bucky's still trying to figure out how to explain this all to Steve, when Nat walks into the kitchen and runs right back out again.

"We got a ** _DOG_**?" she screams, then runs back into the kitchen.

"Um," says Bucky.

"What," Steve demands, "Is going on?"

"Uh," Bucky tries again.

"Hi Dad," Clint says, coming into the living room with Lucky. The dog sits down at Clint's side and pants happily in Steve's general direction. "I got a dog. I'll take care of him, and walk him, and feed him, and he doesn't bark at all!"

Lucky confirms this by woofing loudly.

Steve glares at Bucky.

* * *

The next morning, at 5:45am, there's a knock on Steve and Bucky's bedroom door.

"I gotta take Lucky out for a walk," Clint calls.

Steve rolls over. "This was your idea," he mutters, and pulls the blanket over his head.

"Chicken-shit," Bucky groans, but he gets up and pulls on his jeans and a sweatshirt and off he and Clint go, Lucky on leash, walking through the neighbourhood at the ass-crack of morning.

Clint talks the whole time, about how happy he is to have a dog, and how great Lucky was, and how Lucky slept the whole night on the blankets in the downstairs bathroom ("why in the bathroom?" Bucky asks, and Clint tells him solemnly that it was the warmest room and it was important for dogs to be warm and Bucky is struck by what a kind little boy Clint is turning into) and that he needs to get a part-time job so he can buy toys for Lucky and make sure he has the best food and the nicest collar and after seven blocks of this, Bucky steers them both towards a Starbucks because damn he needs a coffee. 

Back outside with a coffee for himself and a hot chocolate for Clint (Lucky sits with his head on Clint's knee while Clint pets his ears), Bucky makes a deal with Clint that if the boy wants to do more chores around the house, he will increase his allowance so he can buy stuff for the dog. Clint is so happy that he nearly falls off the chair.

"And I gotta write a letter," Clint says when they're back on their feet and heading to the park. "To Lucky's old owner."

"What are you going to say?"

Clint rubs his nose on the back of his hand. "The lady **_said_** , he had to go into a nursing home, and he couldn't take Lucky with him. Maybe he's sad. Maybe he would want to know that Lucky's okay now."

Bucky can't help it - he leans over to give Clint a side-ways hug. "That's a really great idea," Bucky says, a lump in his throat. "You're a good kid."

Clint, because he is _eight_ , rolls his eyes at Bucky. "Maybe I'll draw a picture of our yard, so he knows that Lucky has lots of room to run around in."

The happy moment is lost when Lucky spots a squirrel and runs after it, nearly knocking Clint over, and Bucky makes a firm decision to enrol both Lucky and Clint in a dog training class before the day is over. And then when they get home, Steve's made a great breakfast and he isn't mad at Bucky, not really, but they have a Talk About Making Grown-Up Decisions As A Family Because They All Live Together, ~~at least that's how it starts then Steve accidentally proposes to Bucky and that is a whole different story :)~~

And everyone lives happily ever after.

(even if Nat was grumpy that no one thought to wake her up to go for a walk).

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/142324404252/i-have-all-of-the-questions-about-clint-and>

**James' first birthday when Steve and Clint are around** (set post-story)

So, like, they all went to Disneyland in early February (I'll write that outtake later on) and then it was [Valentine's Day](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2585939/chapters/13803649) and then Steve starts to think about Bucky's birthday (March 10, only two days after Natasha's birthday!) so he thinks about presents and things to do and then randomly is talking to Natasha one day and the conversation goes like this:

**Steve** : Hey, it's your birthday soon.

**Natasha** : In ten days. **Ten**. And then I will be six years old.

**Steve** : And your dad is having a birthday soon too. How about we get him a present too?

**Natasha** : No.

**Steve** : What? 

**Natasha** : Daddy doesn't have birthdays. He said so. He's too old.

**Steve** : <stares> Huh?

**Natasha** : <huffs> Daddy _said_ , he doesn't eat birthday cake anymore because he's too old.

**Steve** : O REALLY (but he's not yelling b/c he doesn't want to scare the kiddo)

later when it's bedtime

**Steve** : Hey Bucky.

**James** : What.

**Steve** : … So, your birthday.

**James** : …

**Steve** : Do you want to do something?

**James** : …

**Steve** : God, say something.

**James** : I'm going to sleep.

**Steve** : <stares at the ceiling for a while>

Later in the morning, James avoids all questions and Steve, who does have two functioning brain cells to rub together, drops it and they do all the morning things and get the kids to school and when Steve goes to work he swings by to have a coffee with Bruce ~~and ask for advice~~ then he calls Abraham ~~and asks for advice~~ and then he goes home early and finds James at work in his home office and then this happens.

**Steve** : Hey.

**James** : Hey.

**Steve** : So I love you.

**James** : … Noted.

**Steve** : And I won't push you on things you don't want to talk about.

**James** : Then why do you look so constipated?

**Steve** : Thanks. Also, shut up.

**James** : So's you come home early to _not_ talk?

**Steve** : I came home early to say I love you.

**James** : …

**Steve** : …

**James** : Whatever. I have to go grocery shopping before I pick up the kids.

**Steve** : Want some company?

**James** : …. Yeah.

and then the afternoon happens, then the evening, and when everyone's tucked into bed and Steve is nearly asleep:

**James** : You awake?

**Steve** : zzz…. Wha?

**James** : This past year.

**Steve** : <rolls over and squishes his face against James' neck> Yeah?

**James** : This has been the best year of my life.

**Steve** : <full-body octopus hug> Me too.

**James** : I don't want to lose you.

**Steve** : <AWAKE NOW B/C WTF> You never will.

**James** : Not any of you.

**Steve** : I'm with you forever. We're a family, _forever_. All of us.

**James** : <hugs Steve hard> I love you.

**Steve** : Forever.

In the morning

**James** : I still fucking hate birthdays

**Steve** : So does this mean I need to cancel the marching band and the sky-writer?

**James** : Fuck you.

**Steve** : Love you too, jerk.

and that is James' first birthday with Steve back in his life. 

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/142336666182/you-mentioned-birthday-headcannons-a-few-months>

**So who gives the kids the sex talk?** (post series)

So the kids have been getting educated in the Ways of Life for years - Bucky's been spending a lot of time talking to the kids about how important it is to make sure that the person you're playing with is having fun, and wants to be there, and that when someone says _no_ or _stop,_ that means _no and stop_. Because those are important lessons for little children and also maybe he got the idea off a parenting blog ~~and maybe he looked back a little at his own life and wished someone had told him that he could have said no and that was important~~ ANYWAY Clint also knows where babies come from, he saw it in a book at the library once, and then when he's older ~~after James and Steve adopt the twins~~ Clint asks his mother specifically where babies really come from, and so Sharon is the one who explains about that to her _very_ interested son.

When Clint tells Natasha what he learned, she is a) grossed out because _ew_ and still confused so she talks to Maria the next time Maria's around and Maria both explains in non-confused-ten-year-old-boy terms, but also pings James to let him know that he has to level up in his parenting skills. It's not that Bucky didn't expect to have to have this conversation at _some_ point, but they're only ten!

_Dude, you told me that you were ten when you figured out you were gay_ , Steve reminds him.

_But I wasn't thinking about sex!_

The look Steve gives Bucky is pitying in the extreme. I _t's not about sex, you dumbass, it's about everything else too, right?_

Bucky spends all night doing research ~~and rocking a cranky Pietro~~ and in the morning he has a lesson plan all ready, about what love is and how puberty makes people feel new things and how some people are attracted to women and some people are attracted to men and some to both, and then Natasha throws a spanner into the works by asking what if you're not attracted to anyone because _sex is gross_ and Bucky flounders and as usual Steve saves the day and says some people aren't sexually attracted to anyone and that's okay too, all of this is normal, and Clint is loudly grossed out but also interested and Natasha is oddly quiet so Bucky just gives up and orders a bunch of books off the internet for the kids to read ~~and goes and lies down in the nursery and the twins crawl all over him and he realizes that he'll have to go through this all over again in another nine years and he almost cries.~~

(When Clint tells Sharon all about his new knowledge, she swings by one day to read the books and figure out what Steve and Bucky told the kids, in case she needs to Add Anything, but it's all good. She buys Natasha another book, just for girls about self-esteem and positive body image, because maybe Sharon wishes someone had told her when she was ten that it was okay to be _her_ , and Natasha gives Sharon the second hug in knowing each other).

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/142376815917/who-gives-the-kids-the-sex-talk-better-question>

**Clint and Bucky paint Clint's glasses** (set randomly after Clint fell off the playground)

I like to think that a week or so after Clint got his new glasses (after the Playground Incident) Bucky hauled a bunch of stuff out of his workshop to the kitchen, and sets up a way to clamp the glasses frames up over the table so they can paint on all sides, and then he uses painter's tape to keep some sections of the frames as black, then (and this is the most important part) he puts plastic over the lenses because getting lacquer off glass is not how he wants to spend his afternoon.

Then Clint is parked in front of his glasses with a paintbrush and encouragement, and he goes to town while Bucky hovers in the background with turpentine and a rag, chattering all the while. (Nat's off playing dance class with Skye; she didn't want to paint.) And Bucky and Clint have serious philosophical discussions about going to start a new school, and Clint's mom being back in town, and swim class, and how much Clint really likes cooking at James' house and maybe they could have hamburgers for dinner and maybe Clint could help make the hamburgers and can he have lots of ketchup?

all in all Clint has a great time painting, and James only has a few minor heart attacks at paint drops on his hardwood floor. When Clint is done and James says they need to let the paint dry for a while, Clint nods and runs out of the room, but then he runs back in again and gives James a huge hug, then runs off again, and James can't stop smiling for an hour.

(James gets up at five the next morning to buff and shine the paint of the glass frames so they're all ready for Clint when he and Steve show up, and Clint is so happy that he can't even speak, and Steve has hearts in his eyes whenever he looks at James, and Natasha says in all seriousness, "You are very good with paint, Clint. You should be a painter man," and Clint sagely agrees to this vocational choice and everything's perfect)

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/142437955657/do-clint-and-bucky-ever-get-around-to-painting-his>

**Steve Rogers breaks his arm by falling off Abraham's roof** (set pre-story)

> _She dug Floppy out of the bag and shoved the toy animal at Clint. He took the toy, cradling it carefully to his chest. "I hit my head, Floppy," Clint said, closing his eyes as he leaned back against Skye's side. "It hurt real bad and I broke my glasses and maybe I cried."_
> 
> _Natasha turned on her heel and dashed from the room, as Skye rubbed Clint's back. "A lot of people cry when they hurt themselves," she said. "It's okay."_
> 
> _Clint pressed a kiss onto Floppy's fuzzy head. "When my daddy fell off the house and broke his arm, he cried. Grandpa Abraham told me so."_
> 
> [Hands of Clay, Chapter 21](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2143266/chapters/10881881)

Here's the story as Steve tells it - he was nearly fifteen (okay, fourteen and a half) and grounded but there was this band playing at the coffee house and there was this girl who liked the band, see, and so Steve decided he'd just sneak out of the house and then sneak back in and Abraham would never know, and it was just a stroke of genius that made Steve think it'd be great to climb out the window and down the tree.

Only it was really dark and it had been raining and Steve's shoes slipped on the shingles and he fell all the way from the roof to the lawn and landed hard on his arm and it broke and hadn't it hurt like a motherf– he means, like a thing that hurt real bad, and then Abraham took Steve to the hospital and he had a cast for two months; the end.

What really happened: 

Steve was flunking algebra.

Like, he was _trying_ , but algebra was hard and his teacher was a complete fucking asshole and math class was at the end of the day and Steve was always so hungry and did he mention the teacher was a complete _asswipe_?

That was no excuse, Abraham had said, his hands folded together over the warning letter from the principal. The one that threatened _summer school_ and remedial classes. It was probably best that Steve focused on his studies for the next few weeks, and it took a long time for Steve to realize that meant he was grounded, and Steve was so angry, because he was _trying so hard_ , and he'd told Amanda he'd see her at the coffee house that night and–

No. No, not while you're under my roof. Your studies must come first.

And Steve had bitten his lip so hard he tasted blood because of course he didn't hear Abraham's quiet tone, didn't see that Abraham was trying to help, because he'd had a foster parent who'd used that line, _not while you're under my roof_ and all that ever landed Steve with was a starving belly for lipping off.

Steve had stormed up to his room and slammed the door (which made Kimberly in her room bang on the wall and yell at him that she was _on the phone, shut up!_ ) and he felt sick and alone because it wasn't like he was stupid, he didn't want Abraham to think he was stupid, it was just that math was so _hard_ and the teacher creeped him out and even though he had friends Steve felt so alone and his only real friend in the whole wide world hated him so much he hadn't even written back in two years and sometimes Steve wanted to puke.

But what if he really was stupid? Would Abraham regret adopting him then? Sally was super smart and in college and on a full scholarship, and Kim was smart too, she was in advanced classes in high school, and Abraham was a doctor and what if Steve was too dumb to be part of the family any more? He was flunking algebra and his history teacher kept giving him C- because Steve didn't buy the party line from their history books and everything else was Bs except for art class but what the hell did that count?

_(At this point, reader, you must remember that Steve was fourteen and an emotional and hormonal mess, which rarely leads to making Good Decisions)_

So, Steve decided, if everyone was determined to think he was stupid, then he may as well give them what they wanted, and fuck his math homework anyway. Amanda said that maybe she'd see him at the coffee house at 8pm. It was nearly 7:30 now, and it was a twenty-minute run across town to get there.

So Steve (frustrated, raging, hurt and confused Steve Rogers) pulled on his jacket, shoved his wallet into his pocket and eased open his window. He could climb down the tree and then back up again and no one would know he was gone.

Only.

It had rained that day, and the shingles on the old house were wood, and Steve's foot slipped as he tried to close the window, and down he tumbled, bashing his head on the eaves before the sickening drop into nothing, then the hard landing and the pain in his arm.

He hadn't ever broken a bone before, but he knew instantly that his arm was broken - his arm looked funny under the jacket and it hurt so bad and Steve knew he was _completely screwed_.

He didn't know how long he lay there, his head ringing, when he heard Kim's voice from above, "Steve, did you hear that… wait, where _are_ you?" Then, "Oh, shit! _Dad!"_ and then a minute later the outside lights came on and Abraham hurried out of the house, and all Steve could think about was how much _trouble_ he was in.

"I'm sorry," Steve blurted out before Abraham even got to his side. This was it. Abraham was going to send Steve back to the foster care system and it was all Steve's fault–

"Oh my boy," And Abraham was helping him sit up, his hands gentle on Steve's shoulders. "Oh dear," he added when Steve yelped at the touch on his arm. "Dear, dear. Did you hit your head?"

And now Steve was crying, just a little, because his arm hurt so bad and falling had been such a shock and he didn't want to leave, he loved Abraham's family. "I'm sorry," he sobbed, all snotty and shaky, and Abraham told Kimberly to go into the house and get a blanket and the car keys, Steve needed a hospital. 

Things got a bit blurry then, but hours later Steve was sitting on a gurney while he was waiting for his cast to dry and Abraham came over and sat beside him and Steve felt like absolute crud. He couldn't even look at Abraham.

"You know," Abraham said quietly. "In East Germany, there was no sneaking out. To be truthful, it was all very boring, if one could avoid the attention of the Secret Police."

Steve sniffled and looked at his cast.

"Here… You American children are different," Abraham went on, still speaking mildly. "If only my Marta could have seen what Sally got up to in her time." He sighed heavily. "And my heart when I saw that you had fallen…" Abraham put his hand on Steve's back. "Steven, you scared the daylights from me."

"I'm sorry," Steve said, feeling even worse. "Am… Am I still grounded?"

This time, Abraham's sigh sounded suspiciously like a snort. "You are grounded until that cast comes off. Come, let's take you home and get you to bed."

"Great, I'm grounded and I'm still flunking math," Steve said on the way to where Kimberly was getting the car.

Abraham cuffed Steve gently on the back of the head. "I'm putting you in a different math class," he said in exasperation. "You are a smart boy and this teacher of yours, I do not like him when he says bad things of you."

"Wait," Steve said, hardly able to believe his ears. "You can do that? Switch my classes?"

Abraham let out a _pffht_. "I defect from East German in the seventies and you think this is hard?" he demanded. "Come, you're going home and to bed."

And Steve was grounded for eight weeks until the cast came off, and he was in a new math class by Monday, and Amanda didn't talk to him again for standing her up at the coffee house but Samuel, a guy in Steve's art class, thought his cast was neat and that was Steve's second high school crush, and to this very day Kimberly still teases Steve about falling out of windows but Abraham never does, and that was all right too.

Bonus: bb!Steve in a cast:

(Chris was sixteen in this, I think, but still close enough for jazz)

<http://mhalachai.tumblr.com/post/142607886137/i-cant-remember-if-i-ever-sent-this-hoc-question>


	13. The One on Christmas Eve

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set on Christmas Eve in the Hands of Clay story. Steve and Clint have already moved into Bucky’s house. No plot spoilers.
> 
> Posting this to try to get myself into the holiday spirit. This is just a bit of holiday fluff.

* * *

"Are they asleep?" Bucky asked when Steve entered the kitchen.

"Finally." Steve rubbed his eyes. "Where do they find their energy?"

"It's Christmas Eve," Bucky said, pouring coffee into a mug. "Kids have a special store of energy for Christmas Eve. You want some?" he asked, holding out the coffee pot.

"Nah," Steve said as he slumped into a chair at the table. It was nearly midnight, and the winter storm outside had settled into a thick fog over the city. The sparkling holiday lights from the houses across the way glittered in the mist. It was, Steve thought as Bucky joined him at the table, perfect.

"Hey," Bucky said as he put his coffee cup down. "You okay?"

Steve nodded. "Just thinking," he said, shifting his chair a few inches closer to Bucky.

Bucky blinked tiredly at him. Steve loved looking at Bucky like this; when it was just the two of them, at night, Bucky seemed years younger than he did during the day. "What are you thinking about?" Bucky asked, his voice soft and quiet, the way it only ever was for Steve.

"Stuff," Steve replied. "Christmas. You. Us."

Bucky rubbed his palm over his face. "It's too damned late to be thinking about anything," he said, but he was smiling. "We still gotta get them presents out of the work room and stuff the stockings. And by then, the kids will probably be up."

Steve put his hand on Bucky's knee. "They were awake until eleven, watching for Santa. They'll probably be out until at least seven thirty."

Bucky rolled his eyes. "They'll be up at five, and cranky all day," he predicted gloomily.

"Maybe," Steve said. "Maybe not."

Bucky sighed. "Come on, we gotta do the presents." He stood slowly, then held out his hand to Steve. "Then we can go to bed."

Steve took Bucky's hand and got up. "I like the idea of bed," he murmured, stepping against Bucky and pressing a kiss to Bucky's cheek. "I like it a lot."

"Ugh, you're terrible," Bucky said, but he put his hand on the back of Steve's neck and kissed him properly. Bucky tasted like coffee and happiness and Steve never wanted to be anywhere else.

"Daddy?"

Bucky groaned into Steve's mouth before he pulled back. "Your kid, you call," he said.

"Why is it always my kid who can't sleep?" Steve grumbled as he headed into the living room. Sure enough, there was Clint, huddled by the stairs, his wide eyes shining from the lights on the Christmas tree. "Hey buddy, why are you up?"

"I thought I heard Santa Claus," Clint confessed. The boy didn't protest as Steve picked him up. "And Floppy was cold."

"Well, that's no good." Steve stood for a minute, holding Clint in the twilight of the living room, with only the Christmas lights and the dim glow from the outside street lamps. "It's pretty, isn't it?"

"Yeah, real pretty." Clint rubbed his nose on Steve's shoulder. "Did Santa Claus come yet?" he asked hopefully.

"Not yet." Steve kissed the top of Clint's head. "You know Santa Claus only comes once everyone's asleep."

"Even you?" Clint curled his fingers in Steve's shirt.

"Even me." Steve turned to climb the stairs. "Bucky and I were just getting ready to go to bed too."

"Good." Clint yawned widely. "I don't want Santa Claus to forget me."

"He won't." Steve walked down the hall to Clint's room. "But you need to go to sleep now."

He put Clint down and helped the boy get into bed, pulling the covers up tight to Clint's chin. Clint wiggled around, making sure that Floppy was in his spot on the pillow. Then Clint said, "Tomorrow's Christmas."

"Yes." Steve sat on the edge of the bed. "All day."

"And I'm going to see Mommy?"

"You sure are." Steve smoothed Clint's hair back from his forehead. "She's coming over at two, and she's going to stay for dinner with us."

"And she'll open my present to her?" Clint asked.

"And she will open your present to her," Steve confirmed. "It's under the tree, right where you left it. She'll see it tomorrow. Now," he went on, tapping the end of Clint's nose. "It's time for you to go to sleep."

He bent over to kiss Clint's forehead. Clint let out a sleepy giggle as he rolled onto his side. "Go ‘way, I want Santa to come," Clint murmured, closing his eyes.

Steve sighed, then stood. He crept out of the room, looking back once to make sure Clint was okay, then closed the bedroom door and tiptoed back downstairs.

While Steve had been busy, Bucky had brought all the presents from "Santa" up from the basement, and was arranging them around the tree. "Did Nat wake up?" Bucky asked as Steve slumped down beside him.

"Nah." Steve looked at the presents. "We're going to spoil them, with so much stuff."

"There isn't too much," Bucky objected. "Two toys each, some clothes, books from Santa, and stuff for the stockings."

"It looks like a lot."

"Yeah, well, maybe Santa went overboard with books." Bucky rubbed his chin. "It's a good thing the kids like to read."

Steve sat back on his heels. In the soft light from the tree, Bucky was so damned handsome that Steve had to take a deep breath. How had he gotten so lucky, as to find Bucky again after all these years?

Meanwhile, Bucky was looking up at the lights, a small smile on his face. "Hey, you remember when we was kids and it was Christmas time? In third grade, I think, when my family was going to my mom's sister's place for Christmas, and you were stuck in that foster home?"

The memory, hazy with the intervening years, could still make Steve smile. "Yeah, and you got all indignant that you wouldn't get to give me my present on Christmas day and so you snuck out of your house after dark to come give it to me? God, did your mom yell when she came to get you."

Bucky snorted. "If I hadn't'a given you those comics books, you'da moped all Christmas break with nothing to do."

Steve shifted over so he could put his arm around Bucky's shoulders. "Every Christmas with you was great," he said. "This one's the best yet."

Bucky turned his head to kiss Steve on the nose. "It isn't even Christmas yet."

"But it's the best," Steve said stubbornly. "You and me, together, and the kids upstairs, and tomorrow's it's Christmas and we'll open lots of presents and have a great breakfast and then dinner with everyone."

"Yeah." Bucky went back to looking at the tree. "You know, sometimes I think about what happened with Natasha—"

"Buck—"

"And sometimes I'm not sure if I'm awake and everything is really okay," Bucky went on. He reached up to squeeze Steve's hand. "But I am. I'm awake, and this is real, and everything is going to be okay."

Steve rested his head against Bucky's. "Everything is okay," he said. "We're all okay. We're all going to be okay together."

Bucky let out a long breath. "You know," and his voice sounded a little shaky, "You're sappy at midnight."

"If it's midnight, doesn't that mean it's Christmas morning? Can I open a present now?"

Bucky shook his head, pulling away to rise to his feet. "The only gift you're getting right now is the gift of sleep," he said as Steve stood up. "The kids are going to be up in a few hours. I'm going to get some shut-eye. You coming?"

"You bet."

It wasn't quite that easy; Bucky had to lock the house up, and Steve did a few last-minute tasks to make getting breakfast together a little easier like setting the table and cleaning up the coffee maker for the morning. But soon, Bucky and Steve were in their bedroom, with the bedside lamp illuminating the room.

"You told Sharon to bring dessert for tomorrow, right?" Bucky asked as he chucked his shirt into the hamper.

"Two kinds of dessert," Steve confirmed. He flopped down onto the mattress, fluffing his pillow. "In return she made me promise that I won't go anywhere near the gravy."

Bucky gave a small chuckle. "You do make terrible gravy."

Steve pointed a finger at Bucky. "Stop ganging up on me, it's Christmas."

"Well, you're not going to ruin dinner, anyway." Bucky finished setting his prosthetic arm on the charging station. "I figured out one of them culinary life hacks." He dropped onto the bed.

"What's that?"

Bucky turned out the light. "The butcher that sold me the turkey had frozen gravy. I bought a quart."

Steve's eyes snapped open in the darkness. "You bought pre-made gravy?" he repeated.

"Yeah." Bucky rolled over to pin Steve down. "What?"

"It's not…" Steve tried to find the word around the physical distraction that was Bucky Barnes. "Traditional."

Bucky sighed. "Steve, in case you ain't noticed yet, we ain't exactly living one of them ‘traditional' lives."

Steve put his hands on Bucky's waist. "We're not?"

"Punk."

"Whatever. You going to kiss me, jerk?"

Bucky obligingly kissed Steve. Very obligingly.

When they finally came up for air, Bucky said, "Hope you liked that, because that's all I got you for Christmas."

"Huh," Steve said. "You got a gift receipt for that?"

"A fuckin' gift receipt," Bucky muttered, sliding off Steve. "Fine, you be that way, I'm going to sleep."

"Aw, Bucky…" Steve curled up around Bucky's body, warm and solid and real. "C'mon, I'll make it up to you."

A momentary silence. "How?" Bucky finally asked, sounding incredibly suspicious.

"I gotta demonstrate."

A sigh, then, "Fine."

Smiling to himself in the dark, Steve set about demonstrating exactly how he would make it up to Bucky.

And just as Steve thought, Bucky had no complaints.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merry Christmas to those who celebrate it, and a joyous winter holidays season to all!


	14. The One at the First Sign Language Lesson

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was supposed to be a quick family bonding exercise, and instead I fell into a rabbit hole of _how does a man with one arm speak sign language?_ and _how might two unilingual children engage with a new language?_ and _how do two formerly single fathers go about raising their kids in a newly merged household?_ Anyway.
> 
> Set in early-to-mid December, so a few months after the "current" time in Hands of Clay.
> 
> The hyperlinked words lead to an ASL dictionary, in case you're interested in learning a bit about American Sign Language.

* * *

"Clint, get out of the car."

Clint didn't move.

"Clint," Steve said again. "Get out. Of the car."

Clint gripped the strap of his seat belt. "No! You can't make me!"

James, waiting on the sidewalk with Natasha at his side, held in a sigh. Since Steve and Clint had moved in with James and Natasha, there had been several conversations between the adults about parenting styles and not stepping on the other's toes. In theory, it all made sense.

In reality, when the children were acting like stubborn teenagers, it was frustrating as hell.

"Clint."

"No!" Clint said again. He glared at his father. "I go to school all week! I don't want go to school on Saturday too!"

"This isn't school," Steve said. "This is so everyone can learn sign language."

Clint turned his head away, scowling.

Natasha tugged on James' hand. "Daddy," she said. "I'm cold."

James looked at his daughter. She was bundled up in a huge winter coat, a bulky beanie pulled over her head, but her legs were clad only in the thin rainbow leggings she had thrown a tantrum over wearing that morning.

This time, James did sigh.

"All right, sweet pea, we'll go inside." James nudged Steve. "Here, lock up when he's out."

Steve took the keys, his expression pinched. "And if he doesn't get out?"

"Then you call me and we'll go home." James reached for Natasha's mittened hand. "We'll see you inside, Clint!" he called as he maneuvered Natasha down the sidewalk.

"Daddy, I want hot chocolate," Natasha said as they stepped inside the overheated building.

"You had breakfast two hours ago," James pointed out as he pulled Natasha over to a low table. "It's too soon for hot chocolate."

Natasha frowned as James wrestled her out of her coat and hat. "No, it's not."

"Yes, it is." James tapped her gently on the nose. "Hot chocolate only in the afternoons. It's a rule."

Natasha heaved a huge, disappointed sigh. "But I'm cold," she whined.

James pushed her hair back. "Then how about we go over to the canteen and get you a cup of tea?"

Natasha made a face, flopping dramatically over James' shoulder. "Tea is _boring_ ," she declared.

"How about candy cane tea?"

Natasha went still. "Do they really have _candy cane tea_?" she demanded.

"Let's go find out."

Much to James' relief, the school canteen did indeed have peppermint tea, and some vanilla syrup that James got them to squeeze into a cup. Father and daughter sat at a table next to the canteen, in amongst a bevy of college students studying on a Saturday morning.

Natasha took a sip of her tea, hardly more than luke-warm with all the ice the barista had put into it, and sighed happily. "Candy cane tea is almost as good as hot chocolate," she told James. "Almost."

"I'm glad you like it," James said. "Can I try some?"

"No," Natasha said, pulling the cup closer to her. "This is _my_ tea."

James sat back to wait.

Ten minutes later, just as James was wondering if he was going to have to go stage an intervention between the Rogers boys, Clint marched through the big doors, red in the face and his hair standing up on end. James only had a moment to wonder if Steve lost the wrestling match before the man himself came inside.

Clint stormed over to the table where Natasha and James sat and pulled himself up into the chair beside Natasha. The girl looked at him. "Do you want some of my candy cane tea?" she offered. "It's good."

Clint sniffled mightily, wiped his nose on his hand, then nodded.

James raised his eyebrows at Steve as the man sat at the table. "My car still in one piece?" he asked quietly so as not to draw the attention of the children.

"Yeah." Steve pulled his scarf off and dropped it on the table.

"How'd you get him in here?"

Steve looked at Clint, who was making a big show out of ignoring his father. "Reminded him that we made this appointment a while ago and that it's rude to not show up when someone is expecting you."

James blinked. That was surprisingly logical for a six-year-old. "He bought it?"

"Yeah, and you can tell how happy he is," Steve grumbled. "Are we late?"

"Nah, we got ten minutes. You know your way around this rabbit warren?"

"I'll figure it out." Steve sat forward. "All right, kids, we're going to go find the room soon. Can you finish your tea?"

"We already did," Natasha informed him. "Can we have hot chocolate this afternoon?"

Clint rotated in his chair far enough so he could look at his father out of the corner of his eye. "Ricky's mom says he doesn't get treats unless he behaves."

"That's up to Ricky's mom to decide about him," Steve said evenly. "We'll see how things go this afternoon. First, we have sign language lessons. Come on, get up."

Natasha slid off her chair and poked at Clint until the boy reluctantly joined her. James heaved himself to his feet. "Let's go find the classroom." He took up the bundle of Natasha's winter gear. "Kids, follow Steve. I'll bring up the rear."

This way, at least, James could prevent Clint from trying to escape.

Natasha's bouncing quickly faded as they walked down corridor after corridor. Clint dragged his feet so much that James ended up putting his hand on the boy's shoulder to hustle him along.

"Are we lost?" Clint whined halfway down yet another hall.

"We'll never find our way home," Natasha moaned. "And we'll never have hot chocolate."

"Yes, lost in the wilds of the Bronx, without a Starbucks in sight," James said. "Keep going."

Up ahead, Steve had stopped outside of a closed door. "Here we are."

"Finally," James muttered. Natasha giggled.

Clint, on the other hand, had stopped a few feet away from the doorway. "I wanna go home," he said, hands curling into fists.

"Clint." Steve walked over to them and knelt down. "We made a deal at the car. If you don't want to participate, you can just sit at the back of the room, but we're going to be here for an hour and I need you to be polite."

Clint crossed his arms over his chest. "I don't know how."

Natasha interjected before Steve could reply. "Yeah you do!" she said, looking confused. "Even Mr. Logan said so, when we went to the field trip place and you were nice to the lady. He said you were very polite."

Clint glowered at the ground.

James caught Steve's eye. "Can I?" he asked. Steve nodded. James got down on Clint's level. "Hey, remember when we were at Uncle Tony's this summer, and we practiced a bit of sign language?"

Reluctantly, Clint nodded.

"That was fun, wasn't it?"

Clint took off his glasses to rub at his eyes. "Yes," he said plaintively.

"So why is today different?"

Clint put his glasses back on. "Skye knows this lady. Skye said so."

James waited.

"And she'll tell Skye that I don't know anything!"

Steve pressed his fingers against his left temple for just a moment. "You know something?" Steve said, holding out his arm to Clint. The boy slumped against his father's side. "I know how excited Skye was that you were going to come to this class, because she knows how much you love to learn new things."

Clint sniffled. "But I don't _know_ sign language."

"Neither do I. And neither does Natasha."

"James does."

"Bucky knows some signs, from when he was in the Army." Steve pushed the hair back from Clint's forehead. "But he doesn't know everything. That's why he's here with us."

Clint mumbled something against Steve's shoulder.

"No, Bucky isn't just here because he drove us," Steve said firmly. "He wants to be here."

"I sure do," James put in.

Natasha coughed. "I want hot chocolate."

"Nat, cover your mouth when you cough," James said, automatically putting his hand on her forehead. She felt cool enough. "Let me feel your throat."

Clint put his hands over his ears, but he didn't try to pull away from his father. While James felt Natasha's throat for any swollen glands, Steve patted Clint's back.

Natasha finally got fed up with her father and pushed him away. "I wanna learn sign languages!" she announced. "Daddy, let's go!"

"All right." James gave Steve some serious eye contact, then gestured with his head towards the door. "Let's take point, Natasha."

"Four-five march!" With that, Natasha stomped down the hall. She stopped outside the door where Steve has stood earlier. "Daddy, you have to knock."

James gave a quick tat-tat on the door, and it was opened almost immediately by a young woman. She looked between James and Natasha, giving them a small wave. "Hi! I'm Abigail," she said, signing along with her spoken words.

Natasha suddenly went shy, hiding against James' leg. James put his hand on her back in reassurance as he said, "James Barnes, and this here is Natasha."

"Hi," Natasha said.

Steve stepped up then, one large hand on Clint's shoulder. "Thanks so much for coming out today," he said, reaching his free hand out to shake. "I'm Steve, we spoke on the phone."

"Nice to meet you," said Abigail. "This is Clint?"

Before the adults could say anything, Clint twisted out of Steve's grip and darted behind James.

"What are you doing?" Natasha demanded, twisting around to look at Clint. "I wanna learn sign languages, don't you?"

"Why don't we all go inside," James suggested, gently steering Natasha into the classroom. "Clint, come with us, please."

Abigail led the way across the room to a low table surrounded by a handful of child-sized chairs. James glanced over his shoulder to see Steve physically block Clint's escape, herding him into the room and closing the door firmly after him.

"Clint, come sit with me!" Natasha yelled as she dashed over to claim a seat. "I wanna know how to say 'cheese' in sign languages!"

James lowered himself into a chair, his knees up around his ears. "Natasha, I'm sure Abigail has a lesson plan she'd like us to use."

Natasha coughed a few times, but she subsided.

Meanwhile, Steve waited until Clint plopped himself into the chair closest to the door, crossing his little arms over his chest and glowering, before seating himself. If James felt ridiculous in the tiny chairs, Steve looked like a character in a cartoon.

"Thank you for coming today," said Abigail as she signed. "Clint and Natasha, your dad said that you would like to learn sign language."

Natasha put her hand into the air. "Steve's not my dad, _he's_ my daddy." She pointed at James. "Steve's just Steve."

"Nat, you shouldn't interrupt," James said gently. Natasha huffed and shook herself like a ruffled bird.

"I can show you how to spell Steve's name," said Abigail, looking between James and Steve uncertainly. "Before we start, are there any questions?"

Natasha put her hand back up again. "Are you a deaf lady?" she asked.

Abigail shook her head. "I can hear."

"Then how come you can use sign languages?"

Abigail smiled. "My parents and my brother are deaf. I learned to sign before I learned to speak."

Natasha's eyes were wide. "That's cool," she breathed.

Abigail raised her hand to her chest and wiggled her fingers. "[Cool](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=478)," she repeated. "Can you try?"

Natasha mimicked the woman's motion, and beamed at Abigail's nod. "Daddy, look!" the girl squealed. "I said _cool!"_ She made the sign again. "You do it!"

James copied the motion, feeling a little silly. Natasha nodded at him just as Abigail had nodded at her.

"You did it!"

"Learning sign language can be easy, if you practice," Abigail said. "Luckily, you can practice with your dad and Steve and Clint."

The latter sunk down in his chair, still glaring at the floor. James exchanged a glance with Steve. Truth be told, James was surprised at Clint's prolonged antagonism to the sign language lesson. It had been a very long time since Clint had dug his heels in this hard on anything.

Luckily, Natasha had enough enthusiasm in her to make up for Clint's silence. "How'd I say my name?" she demanded. "How'd I say _your_ name?"

"You can finger-spell your name," Abigail said, then hesitated. "Do you know your alphabet?"

Natasha rolled her eyes dramatically. "Of course I do. I am in first grade."

"Then you can learn finger spelling. Here's your name." Abigail quickly ran through a series of signs. "Do you want to try with me?"

As Abigail coached Natasha through the seven letters, James spared a glance at Clint. The boy, while sitting sideways as if ignoring the scene in front of him, had his eyes cast all the way to the side to see what the others were doing.

James shifted his gaze to Steve. The man had let go of some of the frustration he'd been carrying around since getting Clint into the building, but his posture was still tense. If James had been any closer, he would have put his hand on Steve's back, or bumped his knee against Steve's, but they were currently separated by a table and two children.

Instead, all James could do was to smile at Steve when the man looked over. Steve blinked, then gave a tired smile in return. In spite of himself, a warm flutter settled into James' stomach. How lucky was he to have Steve in his life?

"Daddy!"

James turned his attention back to his daughter. "Yes, Natasha?"

"Look, it's my name!" She managed the first four signs, then hesitated before starting again. "N-A-T-A…"

"How about we start off with 'Nat'?" James suggested. "We all know it's you."

Natasha huffed. "Okay," she grumbled. "Hey, how'd I say daddy? Do I gotta spell that too?"

"No, that's an easy sign," Abigail said. "Like this." She demonstrated. "That's how you say [daddy](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=759)." She made another gesture. "And that's [father](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=758)."

Natasha echoed the sign for _daddy_. "I like that one better," she declared, then sneezed. "How can I say grandpa? I have a Grandpa Abraham, he's _cool_." She made the sign for the last word, and giggled.

"[Grandfather](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=939)," said Abigail with a sign. "Your father's father."

Natasha giggled again. "Grandpa Abraham is Steve's dad, and he adopted Steve like my daddy adopted me," she told Abigail. "And he said he can be my grandpa too."

"That is good," Abigail said. "Now that you know those words, you can also sign [mother](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=1439), and [grandmother](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=940), too."

Out of the corner of his eye, James saw Clint lift his hand to his chin, to echo the sign, just as Natasha shrugged off the suggestion. "I don't need those. I don't have a mommy, or a grandma either," she said.

Clint's hand dropped.

Damn it. "Natasha, honey," James jumped in. "One of the neat things about learning a new language is that you can talk to other people, people who are different from you. You don't have a mother, but other people do."

Natasha's shoulders slumped in what James knew to be irritation. "Fine," she said. "I'll learn it." She made the sign for mother, then grandmother, and gave her father a glare.

"Thank you," was all James said.

Abigail, who had been keeping an eye on Clint during all this, said, "And there's also a sign for [mommy](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=4676)." She made the gesture. "Same as daddy, father, and grandfather, just at the chin instead of the forehead for mommy, mother and grandmother."

Clint echoed the sign for _mommy_ as Natasha squirmed in her chair. "I wanna learn more words," she said. "How do you say cheese?"

Abigail made a squishing motion with her hands. "[Cheese](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=375)."

Natasha tested out the sign with gusto. " _Cheese_ is my favourite!" she declared. "I love cheese!"

James, who had until now had been able to try out all the signs that Abigail demonstrated with his right hand alone, looked down at the metal prosthetic. He was able to make the hand open and close, and the arm move with concentration, but the flow of sign language was so fast, he didn't know if he would be able to keep up with the metal hand.

But damn it, he was going to try.

Cheese was an easy sign, at least. James held his left hand up, and made the squishing motion with his right. That wasn't so bad.

"What other foods do you like?" Abigail asked the children.

Natasha pursed her lips. "Hot chocolate," she said. "And ice cream."

Abigail showed them the signs for [hot chocolate](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=4670) and [ice cream](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=1087), the last one sending Natasha into a fit of the giggles again.

From further down the table, a small voice said, "I like pizza."

Abigail grinned. "I like [pizza](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=1610) too. One of the neat things about pizza is that there are a few ways to sign it. Here's how we say it in New York." She made the gesture.

Clint, drawn in at last in spite of himself, practiced the word while Natasha frowned at Abigail. "How come people say it different in other places?" she demanded. "Everyone should say it the same."

"Sign language has regional variations, just like spoken language."

Steve leaned forward. "Remember how Mr. Logan says some words differently?" he asked the children. "That's because he's from Canada. And Natasha, your swim instructor in the summer was from Hungary, and she said some words different too."

Natasha's frown did not abate. "But what if I say it wrong to somebody?"

"That's okay," Steve told her. "That's one of the fun things about meeting new people, because you get to know them and how they say things, and you can figure things out together."

Natasha turned to her father. "Is that what happens when you speak languages?" she demanded.

"Yes, it is," James lied. He had never picked up new languages for fun; when he was a teenager on the job, picking up Russian and Spanish from his dad's work crews had been more a social survival skill than anything else. When he'd joined the Army and went overseas, learning Arabic and Dari and enough of the local dialects had been a matter of literal survival.

Even now, the only reason they were in this little classroom space on a Saturday in December was because of the very real concern that one day Clint's hearing might deteriorate to the point where verbal language would fail him.

But James was not about to share any of his concerns or worries with the children. Certainly not now, and perhaps never.

"Okay," Natasha said grudgingly. She turned to Clint, who was at last sitting up and running through some of the signs Abigail had shown them so far that morning. "Clint loves pizza," she told Abigail. "And I love cheese. How'd you say love?"

"[Love](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=1316)," Abigail said, and made the sign. "But you can also say that you [like](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=1276%20) pizza or cheese."

Natasha considered, made the sign for like, then made the sign for love. "I don't like cheese. I _love_ _cheese_."

James looked over at Steve, who made the sign for _like_ , then pointed to James, then waggled his hand in a signal for _so-so_. James made a face at him. Clint caught this exchange and laughed.

"You're silly!" Clint told his father. He turned to Abigail. "How do I say that my daddy is silly?"

"Here is [silly](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=1968)." Abigail made the sign, which sent both Clint and Natasha into fits of giggles. "And then you can say, silly dad."

Clint, still giggling, signed _silly dad_ at his father, gesturing so widely that he nearly tipped over.

Natasha guffawed. "You're silly!" she told Clint, making the sign then pointing at her friend. "Silly!"

Clint made a face at Natasha, sticking out his tongue and squishing up his cheeks, to which she retaliated by pulling down on her cheeks so the whites of her eyes showed.

"Such polite, well-behaved children," James said, making the children laugh. He couldn't tell if they were getting too worked up, or if they were just energized. "Perhaps Abigail can show us some more signs and then you two can practice them a little bit?"

Abigail jumped on this suggestion, quickly running the children through some signs for colours, then some animals. The colour words didn't have much of an impact, but Natasha loved the signs for [bear](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=168) and [spider](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=2830), while Clint kept repeating the signs for [cat](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=334) and [giraffe](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=906).

As James tried to get his left hand to move fast enough to make the spider sign, Natasha jumped to her feet and let out a scream. Clint fell off his chair. Steve started back so quickly that his chair squeaked on the linoleum.

"Geeze, Nat, what is it?" James demanded.

Natasha's eyes had grown wide in her face. "Is there a sign for dinosaurs?" she breathed.

Clint bounced up out of his seat. "Dinosaurs?" he demanded hopefully.

"Yes," Abigail said. "It's like this." She demonstrated the [sign](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=581).

Natasha let out a snort of laughter. "Clint, dinosaurs!" she squeaked, mimicking the sign. "Let's play dinosaurs!"

Clint looked over at his father with wide eyes. "Can we?"

Steve pursed his lips. "How about you two go sit over there and practice the signs you've learned today?" he suggested, pointing to a couch over by the far wall. "Me and Bucky will talk to Abigail for a few minutes."

Natasha made the dinosaur sign again, before dashing across the room, Clint in hot pursuit. Steve slumped back in his tiny chair once the children were out of earshot.

"So things are going okay," James said cautiously, mostly for Abigail's benefit. "Clint acted the same way when he met his summer tutor, Skye, but he's into things now."

"Yeah, Skye mentioned that," Abigail said. She pulled over a binder and flipped open the cover. "She also mentioned that Clint was a bit shaky on his alphabet, otherwise I would have started with finger spelling. That's good to start learning at home, especially at this age."

"They like the animal signs," Steve said. "All this, it's going good. I just hope Clint keeps going strong."

Abigail's hesitation was apparent. "It, um, it's best that parents of children with hearing impairments also become fluent in sign language. Children whose parents can communicate with them have better social and educational outcomes."

For a moment, Steve's face went blank. James was about to jump in, to defend Steve and his parenting skills and tell Abigail how much Steve loved his kid and would do anything for him, but he caught himself in time and made himself sit back. This had been another thing they'd talked about when Steve and Clint moved in; that Steve didn't need James to always find a way to solve Steve's problems - he needed James to trust him enough to let him handle it himself.

In some ways, that was harder for James than the parenting stuff; what use was he to anyone if he wasn't fixing things?

In the microsecond it had taken James to pull himself together, Steve had rallied. "I understand that," he said evenly. "My son sometimes has a hard time in sustaining interest in certain activities."

James hid a wince. Steve's voice had flattened into his professional tones, the ones he used at work and on the phone. Unable to stop himself, James leaned forward. "This is important to all of us, as a family." He directed his words at Abigail, but he hoped that Steve could hear the meaning in his words.

"And part of that means trying to balance Clint's attention with what we all need," Steve went on smoothly. "Clint had some troubles in school last year, but that's sorted out now and we're just trying to make sure that—"

"Natasha?" Clint's voice rose up sharp from across the room. "Daddy!"

James whipped around. One look at his daughter, and James was on his feet and moving. He'd been so focused on Steve that he had taken his eyes off the children for a minute… and that had been long enough for Natasha to work herself up into as asthma attack. She was gasping and wheezing, her hands clutching at her shirt. Her eyes were wide and scared.

"Hey there," James said as he arrived at her side, having already pulled her emergency inhaler out of his pocket. He pushed his own panic and terror away, behind the cold military calm he'd perfected in the Rangers. "It's an asthma attack, we know how these things go. Let's use your inhaler, get ready to breathe in."

With his thumb, James popped off the inhaler cap, gave the thing a firm shake. Natasha's laboured breathing was shallow and fast, so shallow that James wished that he'd thought to bring his backpack with the spacer. But there was no time for recriminations or second thoughts. Natasha needed him to help her.

Natasha grabbed at James' shirt as he held the inhaler to her lips. He waited for her to breathe in to squeeze down on the canister, mostly getting the puff into her mouth. "Thirty seconds," James said as he put his metal arm behind Natasha's back so she wouldn't fall. "We're right here, Natasha, we're going to keep you safe. All you need to do is hold on and breathe."

"Yeah," said Clint in a small voice from his side of the couch. While James had been concentrating on Natasha, Steve had come over to Clint's side, and now the boy was holding his father's hand in a death-grip as he spoke his encouragement. "You can breathe, Natasha, you can do it."

Steve put out his free hand to touch James' elbow. "What do you need?" Steve asked.

James looked back to Natasha. He couldn't tell if her breathing was getting any easier. "Hang in there with us," James said. "Okay, Natasha, time for round two."

The next puff went better than the first, and Natasha's eyes began to lose some of the panic as she took slightly deeper breaths. She was still wheezing, and it was obvious that breathing was a struggle. James counted out to thirty, administered another puff of the inhaler, then counted up to sixty before delivering a fourth puff.

After another thirty seconds, most of her wheezing eased up. Natasha wrapped her hand on James' collar and sniffed loudly.

"Good girl," James said against her hair. "You're doing real good, sweet pea. Let's stay here and breathe some more."

Now that the worst of the moment had passed, James could feel the press of abject terror breathing in his chest, fluttering against his ribs like a trapped bird. It was only a few months since that terrible incident, when Natasha had come so very close to…

No. James slammed that line of thinking down, walled it up inside his head. He wasn't going to think about that now, not when Natasha still needed him. He needed to think clearly. His daughter needed him to think clearly.

"Let's take another puff and see how you're feeling."

Natasha dutifully opened her mouth for another puff off the inhaler. She was breathing deeper now, slower, and the terrible wheezing had mostly faded.

Clint, who had been watching Natasha with eagle eyes, began to edge closer to her on the couch. Steve looked at James, a question in his gaze, but James shook his head. It was okay.

When Clint was close, he reached out to pat the back of Natasha's hand. Natasha looked at him, but didn't speak.

Then Clint did something that surprised the hell out of James. The boy lifted his hand to make the 'N' sign, pointed at Natasha, and crossed his arms over his chest to sign out _love_.

Natasha gulped in air. "Me too!" she exclaimed in a wobbly voice as she let go of James' shirt long enough to sign _love_ back at Clint.

Something stabbed deep into James' chest. He blinked against the sudden stinging in his eyes.

Natasha was going to be okay.

James felt a pressure on his arm, and he looked down to see Steve was squeezing his bicep in reassurance. "Can I do anything?" Steve asked.

James cleared his throat. "Maybe some water. I think we'll be okay now."

"Be right back." Steve patted Natasha's back, squeezed Clint's shoulder, then got up and headed out of the room. This gave James a chance to look for the room's other occupant. Abigail was hovering nervously in the background, gripping her cell phone tight.

"Asthma attack," James said in explanation. "They get worse in the winter sometimes."

Clint got up on his knees, still holding Natasha's hand. "Natasha's my best friend," he said fiercely. "I don't like it when she's sick!"

"I don't like it either," Natasha said crossly, and sniffled again. James pulled her up onto his lap and held her close, his right hand still gripping the inhaler.

Abigail made a sign. "That's how you say [best friend](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=866)," she said. "And you can also say, [I love you](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=1098)."

Clint's face lit up into a grin as he turned to Natasha. He signed 'N', then _best friend_ , then _I love you._

Natasha tried to twist her fingers into the _best friend_ sign. "I can't do it!" she pouted.

"I'll help you." Clint leaned in to put Natasha's fingers in the right order. "There, you can do it."

"Yeah!" Natasha sucked in a deep breath. "Daddy, Clint's my best friend." She made the sign as she spoke.

"I know." He kissed the top of her head. "How are you feeling? Does your chest hurt?"

Natasha rubbed her nose on the back of her hand. "A little."

"Then we're going to sit right here until you feel better."

"Would you like me to tell you a story while we wait for your dad, um, Steve?" Abigail asked.

Clint nodded emphatically. Natasha leaned in against her father as Abigail began to tell the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Clint jumped in whenever he recognized a sign, making the _bear_ sign with enthusiasm.

James let himself zone out slightly, narrowing his focus to his daughter. She was breathing easier now, although there was still some strain on her inhalations. Her fingers twisted occasionally in his shirt, but it was an idle motion instead of a grasping panic. She was okay, James reminded himself. It was an asthma attack that had been contained with the use of her inhaler.

It could have been a whole lot worse.

It wasn't.

But it could have been.

James took a deep breath. He had _known_ how Natasha's breathing had been in recent months, he should have been keeping a better eye on how hard she exerted herself. He should have brought her inhaler's spacer with him. He should have been more alert to what Natasha needed.

It could have been a whole lot worse.

Halfway through Abigail's story, Steve came back into the room, carrying a paper tray full of beverages. He handed Clint a bottle of juice, which the boy took without taking his eyes off Abigail, then sat on the couch beside James. He held out a small plastic cup with a straw to Natasha. "Here you go."

Natasha leaned in for a sip, then broke off to frown up at Steve. "Why'd I gotta have water when Clint has juice?" she asked indignantly, interrupting Abigail.

"Nat," James said.

Steve looked Natasha square in the eye. "There's another juice here for you once you have some water," he said. "Whenever I had an asthma attack, I always liked to have some water first before juice. It makes my throat feel better."

Natasha subsided back against James' chest. "Okay," she mumbled, before jamming the straw back in her mouth.

"Sorry," Steve said to Abigail. The young woman smiled and went back to the story. Steve handed James a coffee cup. "You look like you could use this," he said in an undertone.

"Why, is it full of bourbon?" James murmured, but he took the cup. He nearly choked on the first sip. "Jesus, Steve, is this half cream?"

"One-third cream, one-third sugar, little bit of coffee."

Natasha elbowed James in the ribs. "Shh!" she demanded.

"Sorry." Steve settled in against James' side, and didn't complain when Natasha climbed onto his lap to see Abigail's story better.

James went back to his coffee. The sugar was helping him focus on the bigger picture. Natasha was going to be okay. He would take her to the doctor on Monday and make sure she was okay. He would remember to bring along her inhaler spacer next time they left the house. He would keep an eye on her.

Next time, he would do _better._

He had to.

Natasha handed her water cup off to Steve without looking. "Juice please," she whispered. Steve handed her a bottle of apple juice.

"You keep filling them up with liquids, we're going to have to stop twice on the way home for bathroom breaks," James murmured in Steve's ear.

"It's for the greater good," Steve replied. "You doing okay?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Bucky."

James pressed his lips together. He was silent as Abigail finished the story, showed the children how to applaud for a non-hearing audience, then sent them over to get their winter gear while she showed Steve the next month's sign language homework.

"Daddy," Natasha said. "I finished my juice." She handed him the bottle.

"Me too." Clint handed over his bottle. "I like juice. It's better than soda."

"Not as good as hot chocolate," said Natasha sagely. She signed, _like_ , then _hot chocolate_. "See, Daddy, I learned."

"Very good." James handed Natasha her beanie. "Clint, can you please carry your jacket?"

"Okay."

"Daddy." Natasha patted James on the leg. "I have to pee."

"Okay, but first we have to say goodbye to Abigail."

He herded the children around to where Steve was saying his farewells to Abigail.

"Bye-bye," said Clint with a wave. "Thanks for showing me sign language and stuff."

"Yeah." Natasha let out a cough. "I liked the signs about spiders and cheese."

Abigail smiled at the children. "Thank you both very much for coming to see me today."

Clint put his hand up. "What's the 'thank you' sign?"

Abigail demonstrated. "[Thank you](https://www.handspeak.com/word/search/index.php?id=2186)."

Clint and Natasha both signed their thanks, Steve said farewells, and everyone headed out into the hallway.

"Bucky, I—" Steve began.

"Daddy, I gotta pee!" Natasha burst out.

"Me too," Clint added.

James sighed. "All right, let's find a bathroom."

Luckily, finding the bathrooms was easy. James and Steve stood in the hallway while the children darted into their respective bathrooms. "Bucky," said Steve.

James rested his shoulder against the wall. "Is this where you're gonna tell me to keep my face outta your business?"

Surprise drew Steve's face into a frown. "What?"

"Back there, when you were talking about keeping Clint interested in new stuff?"

Steve punched James very lightly in the arm. "You mean the part where you called us a family? You can keep doing that, you know."

James would have returned the punch, but his arm was weighed down by the kids' winter gear. "Then what are you gonna say?"

"With Natasha." James turned his head away. "You did everything you could. You did everything right."

"Steve."

"Just one more thing then I'll shut up." Steve leaned against the wall at James' side. "She's okay."

James looked at Steve.

"She's okay," Steve repeated. "She's got you."

James had to clear his throat to push back the sudden threat of tears. "And she's got you," he said. "You and Clint."

"Yeah," Steve said. "And so do you."

"Aw, shut up," James said, mostly so he wouldn't do anything as silly as cry in the hallway. "You need to go empty the tank before we head home?"

"No, I'm fine." All the same, Steve moved towards the entrance to the men's bathroom. "Clint, hurry up!"

Natasha wandered out of the woman's bathroom. There were child-sized wet hand marks on her leggings. "I couldn't reach the paper towels," she informed her father.

James knelt down to help Natasha into her parka. "How are you feeling?"

Natasha considered this question. "I don't like it when I can't breathe," she said at last. "It's bad."

"I agree," James said solemnly. "Do you remember what you were doing when it happened?"

Natasha nodded. "Clint and I were playing dinosaur sign language and I think I got too excited."

James pulled the beanie down on Natasha's head. "If you feel like your chest is tightening up, you have to stop what you're doing and sit quietly, okay? Dr. Bennett told you that a couple weeks ago."

Natasha made a face, then signed _silly_.

"I know, but it's just the way things are." James signed _I love you_ to his daughter, who beamed. "Sign language class was fun today, wasn't it?"

"Uh huh," Natasha said. "I like it. Can we talk in sign language at home too?"

"We sure can. Steve got some stuff for us all to work on together. And by the next time, hopefully we can spell things out with the alphabet and everything."

Natasha tugged at her lower lip. "But what if I don't know how to spell a word?"

"Then we can work on your spelling too." James kissed Natasha's forehead. "I love you, sweet pea."

Natasha pushed her father away. "I know," she said. "You're weird."

"You're weird." James stood up to pull on his own jacket. "You ready to head home?"

"Yeah." Once James had his hands free, Natasha slipped her hand into his. "Daddy, are Clint and Steve always going to come home with us?"

James hesitated, then knelt back down. "Yes, they are," he said firmly. "They live with us now. Our home is their home."

Natasha squeezed James' hand. "That's good," she said, and leaned in against him. "I like that."

"Me too." James hugged Natasha. "I like that too."

The moment was broken as Clint hopped out of the bathroom, Steve on his heels. Clint signed _silly_ and _daddy,_ then rolled his eyes.

Natasha giggled. _Silly cheese!_

 _Silly bear!_ Clint shot back.

James looked at Steve, and smiled. "How about we take these little monsters home and get them some lunch?"

"Yeah," said Steve with a brilliant smile of his own. "Let's go home."

_end part_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just trying to get back into the swing.


End file.
